


What He Left

by 42Zombies



Category: Night In The Woods (Video Game)
Genre: Comedy, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Post-Game(s), Slice of Life, Tags May Change
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-27
Updated: 2018-08-28
Packaged: 2019-02-22 09:36:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 48,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13164195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/42Zombies/pseuds/42Zombies
Summary: When people die, they leave things behind. Sometimes those things aren't what you expected. Sometimes you wind up wondering how well you ever really knew them.Just when Mae and her friends are finally recovering from their night in the woods, a note from Casey starts to stir up old ghosts. As Mae struggles to deal with all of the things Casey left behind, she finds herself learning things she never knew about her old friend. Some of them might be pretty weird. Some of them might be dangerous. Some of them might be buried out in the woods somewhere.Things will probably be fine, though. Maybe.((Currently on Hiatus))





	1. The Note

Possum Springs never changed very much.

Oh, sure, there were some things that changed. Businesses closed down. Occasionally, new ones would spring up to replace them. People moved away, or died, or both. And every so often, a sinkhole, flood, or blizzard would wreck half the town.

But the more things changed, the more they stayed the same. In no place was that more true than in Possum Springs.

Mae took a little bit of solace in the town’s sameness. For one thing, it meant that those nutso cultists from last year had been wrong. In the months since the incident in the mine, the town hadn’t been destroyed by a blizzard, or eaten by a giant goat, or whatever those guys had been worried about. The town wasn’t getting any more business, but it also wasn’t getting any less. Things had more or less stabilized.

The only major change that had happened since that cold November in the mines hadn’t even been that bad. A car had swerved of the road and crashed into the front steps of Old Man Varney’s porch. No one had been hurt, but Varney certainly wasn’t happy about it. But he’d gotten to work fixing his porch, and soon nobody would be able to tell there’d even been an accident.

Same old, same old.

Things had stayed very much the same for Mae and her group of friends, too. Mae was still unemployed. Bea was still working up at the Pickaxe. Gregg and Angus were still saving up for Bright Harbor. Germ was still hanging out in the old parking lots for some reason.

And, of course, Casey was still dead.

Despite this, life went on. The holidays had passed, the New Year had come and gone, and winter was slowly but surely fading away. Pain faded away, or at least became more manageable. The time for mourning had passed, and now it was time to take care of what had been left behind.

Gregg was the one who brought the idea to Mae. More accurately, he vaguely explained it and then dragged her along for a trip to Casey’s house. According to Gregg, there was something very important that needed to be done for Casey.

“It’s, like, a duty,” Gregg had explained as they made their way to Casey’s old neighborhood. “It’s like being a godfather or something. We need to do this for him. It’s one of the most important things we can do, Mae.”

The important duty Gregg was describing was, of course, going into Casey’s room and getting rid of all of his porn for him.

“Who even owns physical copies of porn anymore?” Mae asked skeptically. “Don’t people just use the internet? I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen real-life porn outside of the adult section at the Video Outpost.”

Gregg thought about this, and then shrugged. “I dunno. Casey and me just agreed to do this back during graduation. I just figured it’s about time I finally got around to it.”

Casey’s house was a single-story, shabby little home on the outskirts of Possum Springs. The paint on the house was a bit worn, and the lawn always looked like it needed a bit of mowing. Casey’s parents had always been too preoccupied with other matters to really worry about their home’s appearance. It looked as if that hadn’t changed.

Gregg reached up and pressed the button for the doorbell. Then he pressed it a few more times, just for laughs. Soon, the door was opened by a thin, middle-aged man who looked as if he hadn’t shaved in weeks. The man seemed surprised to see Mae and Gregg, and a friendly smile soon appeared on his face.

“Well, hello, Mae! Hello, Gregg! How are you two doing?”

Mae lifted her hand up and waved at the man who’d opened the door. “Hi, Mr. Hartley.”

Mr. Hartley wasn’t really named Mr. Hartley, of course. Mr. Hartley was—or, had been—Casey’s stepdad. Mae just called him Mr. Hartley because she could never remember his real name. It was probably Doug or something, but it felt weird to call a friend’s parent Doug. Doug was a weird name for a parent to have, anyway.

“What are you two doing here?” Mr. Hartley asked. His eyes drifted in Mae’s direction. Before he even spoke, Mae knew what question he was going to ask. “Mae, aren’t you supposed to be in college? Or is Longest Night break just longer than it used to be?”

Mae did her best to try and not look guilty. She was more or less over college, but she still felt bad whenever someone asked her why she wasn’t in school. Mae had been asked that very question by pretty much every adult she knew since she returned to Possum Springs. Mae guessed she was going to have to get used to the oblivious guilt slinging for a while.

It wasn’t like Mae had any control over why she’d dropped out, though. She had no reason to feel guilty. That’s what her parents and Bea said, at least. But it was a little hard not to feel ashamed when a surprised adult obliviously asked why she wasn’t at school.

“College didn’t really work out too great,” Mae said, looking off to the side. “I’ve been back since October. I’m only just getting around to visiting here, I guess.”

After a moment, Mae added, “Sorry about Casey.”

Mae hadn’t intended to bring Casey up right away. Judging by the look on Gregg’s face, she’d definitely brought it up way too soon. And now the mood was turning all weird. Mr. Hartley’s smile faltered a bit, and he looked as if he’d just deflated a little bit. Mae knew that look; it was how you looked when you were sad, but tired of showing it.

“Thank you, Mae.” Mr. Hartley sighed, looking down at his feet. “That’s… nice to hear. But we’re holding out hope. I’m sure he’ll come home someday.”

Mae said nothing. Neither did Gregg. Both of them were afraid that anything they might say would give away the secret they were keeping. Neither of them wanted to lie to Mr. Hartley, either. But they certainly couldn’t tell him the truth. Not just because the truth would break his Hartley heart, but because the truth was unbelievable.

Casey Hartley was dead. He was dead and lying at the bottom of a hole in a collapsed section of a mine. All because some old men thought that killing off people they didn’t like would somehow bring back something that they had never had in the first place. The same thing happened all over the world, although not usually so literally.

“What brings you two by?” Mr. Hartley asked. Mae and Gregg both thanked God for the change in subject.

“I left some stuff here the last time I came over,” Gregg said. “Was wondering if I could go into Casey’s room and look for it?”

Mr. Hartley looked faintly surprised by Gregg’s request. “The last time you were here? Gregg, that was nearly a year ago. Why did you wait until now to come pick it up?”

Gregg glanced off to the side nervously. He hadn’t expected his super-believable lie to get called out so quickly.

“Well, things have just been… crazy lately. Me and Angus are getting set to move to Bright Harbor, so I forgot all about it. But then Mae said she wanted to stop by, and I remembered. So that’s why we’re here. It’s a good and normal reason.”

Mr. Hartley looked as if he didn’t entirely buy it. On the other hand, he also had no reason to suspect that Gregg and Mae were up to no good. Mr. Hartley knew that Casey and his friends were troublemakers, but they were still good people. And so, with a welcoming smile, Mr. Hartley stepped to the side and invited Mae and Gregg in.

The Hartley household hadn’t changed much since the last time Mae had visited. The greying walls, shaggy carpeting, and smell of dust in the air hit Mae with a rush of nostalgia. She was suddenly overcome with memories of coming over to play video games with Casey, or to meet up with him for band practice in his garage.

It wasn’t a good feeling. But it wasn’t exactly a bad feeling, either.

Without waiting for another word, Gregg hurried on down the hall that led to Casey’s old bedroom. Mae was left alone in the living room with Mr. Hartley, both of them standing around awkwardly. Mae glanced around the room, hoping she could avoid conversation. Wherever she looked, though, all she saw were photos of Casey.

He was smiling in all of them. That wasn’t too surprising; you were supposed to smile in photos, after all. But the small, closed-lip smile Casey had in each of the photos hurt Mae in a way she couldn’t really describe. It was a smile that seemed to say that Casey and the camera had a friendly secret between the two of them.

Mae looked away from the photos. When she looked back at Mr. Hartley, however, she saw that Casey’s stepfather was staring at her.

“… What’s up?” Mae asked curiously.

Mr. Hartley cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck. “I was just wondering if Casey had gotten in touch with you before he disappeared. But I guess you already would have said so if he had. Sorry.”

Mr. Hartley offered a smile as way of apology, but it just made Mae feel even worse. Here she was, alone with someone who needed to know something Mae couldn’t tell him. The knowledge of Casey’s death had been eating Mae up inside lately, and being around Mr. Hartley sped up the process.

Mae found herself wishing she hadn’t come here. When Gregg had said he needed to get something from Casey’s house, Mae hadn’t thought about what that would involve. The fact she’d have to interact with Casey’s parents had completely slipped her mind somehow. Then again, Mae had never been the best at forethought.

“So are you still a plumber?” Mae hoped that her attempt to change the subject wouldn’t come across as too obvious.

“Yes,” Mr. Hartley said. “I’m still a plumber.”

Mae hadn’t expected him to answer that quickly. Now the conversation was dead and things were awkward again. Mae wished she knew more about plumbing so she could keep the conversation going. The silence was killing her.

“Hey, Mae!” Gregg’s voice came in loud and clear from the other side of the house. He was yelling a bit louder than he probably needed to. “Could you come in here for a second? I need your help with something!”

“Coming!” Mae called out. She glanced at the confused Mr. Hartley quickly as she made her way past him. “Sorry. Be right back, probably.”

Mae hurried out of the den, away from the intense discomfort that had been weighing down on her. It was a straightforward run down the hallway to get to Casey’s room. Mae had made the drip dozens of times in the past. This time, though, there was no Casey to hang out with. There was just a Casey-shaped hole in the world.

Mae only felt worse when she actually opened the door to Casey’s old bedroom.

Casey’s room looked more-or-less exactly how it had looked the last time Mae had been there. There were game consoles and racks of games set up near an old TV on top of the dresser. Posters for various bands and skaters were hung up on the walls. A thin layer of dust had set over everything. Nobody had used the things in this room for months.

Mae’s chest hurt just looking at it all. For some reason, the thought of all of Casey’s possessions being neglected and forgotten was making Mae feel like crying. Nobody would ever sleep in this room again. Nobody would play Casey’s old video games, or surf the net on his laptop.

Well, maybe somebody would. Maybe one day the Hartleys would give up on their missing son and give away his things. Then some stranger would buy his games or his skateboard at a yard sale and take them home, completely oblivious to the memories attached to those objects. To that person, they would just be things. To Mae, though, everything in Casey’s room was like a piece of his ghost.

Mae closed the door behind her and walked in on the hardwood floor. Casey’s closet door was open, and Gregg was on his hands and knees searching around. His search was somewhat hampered by the pile of dirty laundry littering the floor of the closet, but Gregg wasn’t deterred.

“Geez,” Mae muttered at the sight of the dirty boxers and shirts. “Casey was really bad about laundry, huh? Even I’m not this messy.”

“Yeah, this is a real mess.” Gregg reluctantly stuck his hands into the pile of clothes and began sifting through it. “I used to leave piles of laundry around like this back when I lived with my folks.”

“How’d you stop?” Mae asked.

“I started doing my own laundry when I moved in with Angus,” Gregg explained. “I didn’t want him to think I was messy.”

“You are messy, though,” Mae pointed out.

Gregg either didn’t hear her, or was distracted by a realization. “Hang on, do you even do laundry? I’ve only seen you wear that one shirt since you got back.”

“It’s a good shirt!” Mae said defensively. She’d made it herself in home ec. She’d even gotten an A!

Gregg continued feeling around under the dirty clothes in the closet. It didn’t take Mae very long to get bored of all this.

“Didn’t you say you needed my help?” Mae asked impatiently.

Gregg didn’t look up, his focus entirely on the search. “There’s, like, a loose floorboard somewhere in here. Casey kept all of his secret shit under it, remember?”

Mae frowned, puzzled, and raised a brow. “No? I don’t think so. I never saw any weird floorboards or whatever. Whenever I came over, we just played video games or threw stuff at each other’s faces.”

The fact that Casey had a loose floorboard he hid stuff under was incredibly cool, though. Mae was a little disappointed that Casey had never shown it to her. Why had he shown Gregg and not her? Was it full of _**manly**_ things, like condoms or pictures of trucks? That was the only reason Mae could think of for her to not know about these floor secrets.

Just when Mae was beginning to wonder how much longer they’d be standing around, Gregg let out a cry of triumph. The pile of laundry ruffled as Gregg moved something underneath it. Slowly, Gregg pulled a small plank of wood out from under the clothes and tossed it aside.

Mae watched as Gregg’s hands returned to the closet, to where the floorboard he’d just removed had been. After a while, Gregg pulled a large box out and set it down at Mae’s feet. The dirty laundry fell into the hole that the box had been removed from.

Mae looked down at the box. It was some sort of army box—it was green, and metal, and had ‘US ARMY’ stenciled on the front in yellow paint. Someone had crossed out those words, however, and replaced them with ‘CASEY’S STASH’.

Gregg popped open the lid of the box. Mae looked into Casey’s stash and found herself staring at a stack of magazines. A few plastic bags were crammed into the side of the box, but Mae couldn’t make out their contents.

Besides, the magazines were more interesting. The cover of the magazine on top of the pile had a girl on it. The girl was only wearing a pair of overalls, and was leaning over the seat of a tractor in a manner that was probably supposed to be seductive. Mae didn’t think that any picture with a tractor in it could really be considered sexy, though.

According to the title at the top of the cover, this periodical was known as ‘TRACTOR GIRLS?’

“Why is there a question mark?” Mae wondered aloud. Gregg had no answer for her.

“Help me sort through all of these,” Gregg said as he lifted the magazine out of the box. He set it aside and pulled out another, slowly forming a stack of porn outside the box.

“We’re only taking the porn,” Gregg clarified. “The non-porn can stay behind.”

“That’s a weird thing to say,” Mae said as she joined in on the work.

The two spent a few minutes going through the stack of magazines, sorting them all out. There were such enlightening titles as ‘DIRTY PUNK GIRLS’, ‘XXX BOXING ILLUSTRATED’, and, inexplicably, ‘THE SAD NASTY ONES’. There were several more copies of ‘TRACTOR GIRLS?’ and a few copies of ‘RUST BELT FULL-AUTO MONTHLY’, as well.

“Where did he even get some of these?” Mae asked as she pulled out a magazine with a cover she wished she could instantly forget. “And why does he have so many? Like, who even needs this much porn?”

“I think some of these belonged to his bio-dad,” Gregg said. He both looked and sounded like he was already tired of looking at these magazines. He probably wasn’t fond of all of this rampant, in-your-face heterosexuality. Mae couldn’t blame him. Even she was getting a little tired of magazines with titles like ‘FILTHY SECRETS’ and ‘BISEXUAL BI-MONTHLY SEXCAPADES’.

“So, his dad died and Casey got his boat and his porn?” Mae asked. “But his dad didn’t bother leaving them any money or anything?”

“Is that surprising?” Gregg asked.

Mae shrugged. “Not really.”

Mae had met Casey’s dad back when he was alive. The guy had been a living, breathing example of a deadbeat dad. Even when Mae was young, she understood that Casey’s bio-dad was kind of a shit. Nevertheless, after he’d had his heart attack, everyone had had to go to his funeral and act like he’d been such a great guy. Death was weird like that.

There were only a few magazines left at the bottom of Casey’s secret army locker. These ones looked fairly old, their covers worn around the edges. Mae reached in and pulled the final magazines out so they could join the others in the pile. As she did so, however, something stuck to the back of the bottom magazine fell down into the box.

Mae looked down into the army locker to see what she had dropped. A small, white envelope was sitting at the bottom of the locker, surrounded by baggies of weird, white crystals.

“What is that?” Gregg asked in surprise.

Mae reached into the locker and picked the envelope up. She turned the white rectangle over, revealing the four words inscribed on the front:

_GREGG – OPEN IF DEAD_

Before either Mae or Gregg could inspect the envelope any further, a noise from the outside hallway grabbed their attention.

“Hey, are you two okay?” Mr. Hartley asked as he slowly opened the door. “You two have been taking a while to—”

Mr. Hartley stared into the room, his eyes naturally drawn to Mae, Gregg, and the stack of pornography they had pulled out of Casey’s locker. Mr. Hartley’s gaze lingered on the magazine at the top of the stack, which was the September, 2009 copy of ‘BUTTS & ASSES MONTHLY’. The picture on the cover was one that could not be shown in public.

Mr. Hartley said nothing. He glanced off awkwardly as he stepped back into the hallway.

“I’ll, uh… I’ll let you two get back to getting rid of my son’s porn.” He said as he closed the door on them.

Mae and Gregg took that as their cue to leave.

Everybody was too embarrassed to look at each other when they left.

 

* * *

 

The most natural place to take a pile of pornography was, naturally, Gregg and Angus’s apartment.

Mae and Gregg had had some trouble carrying all of the magazines all the way back to Towne Centre. Gregg had seriously underestimated the amount of porn that Casey had been in possession of. Without any reliable transport, the two had had to wander through the streets of Possum Springs with stacks of pornography clung to their chests.

Angus had been home when Mae and Gregg arrived. He said nothing when they dumped the dirty magazines in the middle of the living room. He just got up and went into the kitchen for a while. When he got back, Mae and Gregg showed him the envelope.

“Are we supposed to open this if Gregg is dead, or did Casey want Gregg to open it if Casey was dead?” Angus asked.

“It’s really unclear,” Gregg said. He had taken his leather jacket off and thrown it on the pile of magazines in an attempt to make things less horribly awkward. It kind of worked.

“I think we should open it. If it’s meant for Casey, then it’s the right time. If it’s meant for Gregg, I don’t wanna wait for him to die of, like, heart attacks or whatever.” Mae reached out to take the envelope from Angus and began opening it.

“You really think I’m going to die from natural causes?” Gregg sounded touched at the idea. It was nice to think he’d die naturally, and not from doing something stupid like riding on the roof of a moving car.

Mae ignored Gregg’s question and focused on the envelope. She tore the paper open and fished its contents out. It never occurred to Mae to be careful in order to avoid ripping the note inside the envelope. It never occurred to Mae to be careful in general.

The sloppy, chicken-scratch handwriting on the unfolded note confirmed it had been written by Casey. While most people wouldn’t have been able to read the note, Mae had been friends with Casey for years. She was pretty much fluent when it came to the scribbles that passed for Hartley’s handwriting.

For the sake of Angus, though, Mae read the note out loud.

_To Gregg,_

_If you’re reading this, it means I died before you and you’re getting rid of my porn for me. Thanks. Sorry you gotta go through my smut. You can keep the gun catalogs I’ve got in there if you want._

_I just got news that my cousin died. Maybe I’ll tell you about it, maybe I won’t. I’m feeling pretty shook right now. When my ma told me about it, I went to my room, sat down, smoked a joint, and got all sad. Then I smoked another joint to cheer myself up and decided to write down a will._

_So, if this shit doesn’t make since, it’s ‘cause I’m high as eff._

_I don’t got a lot to give away. I got my boat. I got my games. I dunno if you guys want that, though. So, if I’m dead, feel free to just, like, take my stuff and split it up amongst yourselves. But I’ve got something I know you’ll be able to use: cash. A ton of cash._

_My cousin and me had a lockbox fulla cash. He’s dead, so he’s not gonna need it. I don’t wanna keep it around, neither. I’m gonna bury it somewhere for if anything happens to me, or for if I ever need to dig up some money._

_Look for that place with the weird tree. It’ll be buried there._

_Okay, bye._

A sad, yet confused silence settled into the apartment. Reading a message from a dead friend had made Mae, Gregg and Angus all a little teary eyed. Realizing he’d written the message while high had made them all a little perplexed. But it was the last part of the message that was the most confusing.

“Where’d Casey get a lockbox full of cash?” Mae asked. “Hell, where’d he get a lockbox?”

“And why would he bury it?” Gregg held the letter up close to the face, as if proximity would somehow reveal some big secret.

“Well, from the sounds of it, he was pretty high,” Angus pointed out. “I think it’s a safe bet that Casey wasn’t thinking logically about all of this.”

Mae sat there, puzzled. There was a lot about the note that was confusing. For one thing, Mae had no idea that Casey had done drugs. She knew he smoked cigarettes, but smoking joints was something else entirely. Where would he even get weed in a town like Possum Springs?

The thing that was bothering Mae, however, was the mention of Casey’s cousin. Mae had never met him. Hell, Mae hadn’t even known Casey had had a cousin until last November.

A lot about that night was fuzzy. Mae could only recall bits and pieces of the events in the old mines from last year. But one of the things Mae remembered clearly was what the men in the dark had said. In particular, Mae could remember learning of Casey’s death with perfect clarity.

Thinking about it made Mae sick. Those bastards hadn’t even known Casey. They acted like he was a criminal and a deadbeat just because of some things in his past. But Mae knew that Casey wasn’t what those people thought he was. He wasn’t a criminal, or the type of person to ditch people if times got tough.

Casey was good.

“Mae?”

Gregg’s concerned voice caught Mae by surprise. She realized with some embarrassment that her eyes had been tearing up. With a sniffle, Mae tried to nonchalantly dry her eyes.

“Sorry,” Mae grumbled. “Just remembering stuff.”

“It’s cool,” Angus said reassuringly. “You can cry if you need to.”

“Nah, I’m good,” Mae said with a sigh. Her throat was a little sore, but she felt like she wasn’t at risk of shedding more tears. “It’s not a full cry. Just, like… a baby cry. For a baby sadness.”

Gregg set the note down on the carpet and folded his arms. “Okay,” he said. “What do we do about this? Should we go looking for the money? Where would we even start?”

“Should we tell Bea about this?” Mae asked. She felt a little weird about not having her other best friend around during this. Apparently, though, things were pretty busy at the Pickaxe.

“I think we have to,” Angus said. “I mean, I don’t know where else we’re going to get a shovel.”

Mae frowned a bit. She could definitely remember that her family had a shovel somewhere around the house. But Mae hadn’t seen the shovel since she stayed up all night digging a hole in the backyard in a sugar-fueled manic episode. After her parents had found her asleep at the bottom of a hole, they’d both decided it would be smart to keep Mae away from both Eternity Sauce and any sorts of digging implements.

“Okay, so… are we actually doing this?” Gregg asked. He sounded unusually worried. Mae had thought that Gregg would have been super excited about the idea of a treasure hunt. Maybe he just wasn’t a big fan of digging.

“I think that we kind of have to.” Mae picked Casey’s note up off of the floor and stared hard at the scribbly handwriting. “This is something that Casey left behind for us. Ignoring it would just be… I dunno, bad.”

Mae shrugged. She didn’t really have any better words for it.

Gregg still looked uncertain, but eventually a sigh escaped him. “Okay,” he said. “I’ve got a bad feeling about all this, but okay. I’m in if Angus is in.”

Mae looked expectantly at Angus, whose ears perked up at the mention of his name. “What?” He said. “I mean, I guess I’m in. It all depends on where Casey buried this thing. If we can get to it without breaking any laws, then it’s fine.”

Mae opened her mouth to let out a groan of disappointment, but she stopped herself. Gregg and Angus were both sharing a worried look. Mae had nearly forgotten about how hard Gregg was trying to keep himself out of trouble. It was no wonder that both Gregg and Angus were reluctant about finding Casey’s money.

“It should be fine!” Mae said confidently. “We’re basically just digging up a time capsule or whatever. I mean, who ever got into trouble for digging something up?”

“Grave-robbers,” Angus responded.

“Pirates,” Gregg added.

“Okay, we’re neither of those things. We should be fine,” Mae said, conveniently forgetting all of the movies she’d torrented and the one skeleton that she had exhumed.

Gregg and Angus shared another look. This time, though, they were smiling. That, in turn, made Mae smile. The sense that something big was starting was slowly setting in, and the three friends were looking forward to it. All that was left to do was let Bea know about this.

She’d probably think it was great.


	2. The Memory

“Mae, this is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard,” Bea said as she finished locking up the Ol’ Pickaxe.

Mae had gone straight to the Pickaxe after finishing up her business at Gregg and Angus’s apartment. The February air was cold, and it stung Mae’s skin whenever the wind blew. The sun’s light was dimming, and the sky overhead was already a steadily darkening blue. Gray clouds hung up above, threatening Possum Springs with snow.

The possibility of bad weather meant the streets were more or less empty at the moment. Lights shined from windows and signs, bathing the town in an eerie glow. The lack of people walking about only made the whole scene seem lonelier.

Mae didn’t mind that much, though. She liked it when Possum Springs was like this. It was like a painting or a photograph in real life.

“Is it really?” Mae asked skeptically. “Is it really the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever heard, Beatrice?”

“Okay, it’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard lately.” Bea stuffed the keys to the Pickaxe into her dress’s pockets and hurriedly fished out a cigarette. Mae couldn’t tell if it was a real cigarette or one of the dummies that Bea was using to quit.

“I mean, I don’t disbelieve you,” Bea continued. “I’m just saying this seems really, really weird. Like, was Casey really the type of guy who’d bury something and then send his friends on a scavenger hunt? Was that his thing?”

Mae nodded. “Yeah, Casey was kind of really into messing around with people like that. I don’t know how big he was on burying stuff, though. I feel like he was pretty neutral on digging in general.”

Bea placed the cigarette between her lips and shoved her hands into her pockets. She shuddered a bit. Her goth aesthetic did not lend itself particularly well to winter temperatures. Girl needed to wear some dang layers.

“Do you even know where to start looking?” Bea asked. “Because I have to work. I can’t go all around town with you to try and find a good place to dig.”

Mae wanted to say that she wasn’t planning on running all around town, but stopped herself. She really didn’t have the first clue where Casey might have buried this alleged lockbox full of alleged money. The only landmark his note had given was the mention of a ‘weird tree’, which was a pretty worthless clue. Especially considering that Possum Springs was basically 80% trees.

“I’m beginning to think that people who’re high on drugs shouldn’t organize treasure hunts,” Mae said.

“Wait, what?” Bea’s eyes widened in alarm. “Casey did drugs? Are we talking weed, or are we talking real drugs?”

Mae shrugged indecisively. “Weed, I guess. Isn’t weed a real drug?”

“Barely,” Bea muttered.

The two walked away from the Pickaxe’s front door, eager to get out of the cold. Bea’s car was parked behind the shop. While Mae could easily just walk to her house, she didn’t want to stick around in the cold. Bea didn’t bother asking if Mae needed a ride; she simply opened the passenger door for her.

“Remember middle school health class?” Mae asked as Bea turned the key in the ignition. “We had, like, two weeks of drug-prevention classes. We watched videos, and a cop came in to tell us about how drugs would make us die or kill babies.”

“I remember that,” Bea said. “That was around the time we stopped hanging out, I think. We had health education in different periods.”

“Oh, right.”

Mae frowned. She still felt bad about how she’d just suddenly stopped talking to Bea back in middle school. Looking back, Mae supposed that her granddad’s death had had a lot to do with it. After he passed away, Mae had stopped doing a lot of the stuff she’d used to love doing.

And then, a few months later, there had been the softball incident.

It was easy to believe that all of that stuff was connected to each other. But Mae wasn’t so sure. Mae didn’t know if one single thing was the cause of all of her problems. Mae felt like the stuff that sometimes went on inside of her head was something that just happened.

The car pulled out from behind the Pickaxe and made its way onto the main street. Moody, electronic music played on the radio. Mae didn’t know if this was a channel Bea liked, or if it was a CD. It seemed to be all that ever played in Bea’s car, though.

“Actually, I just remembered,” Bea said as the car began to heat up, “The cop that came in to talk to my health class? It was your aunt.”

“Oh god,” Mae groaned. “That must have been terrifying. Aunt Mall Cop should not talk to small children.” The idea of Aunt Molly coming into a classroom, glaring at a bunch of middle schoolers, and lecturing them about meth was like something out of a nightmare.

Mae couldn’t really remember a time when she and her aunt had ever gotten along. Even when Mae had basically been a toddler, Molly had treated Mae like a handful. It was pretty clear that, out of the two of them, Mae’s mom had been the one to get all of the warmth. Molly, meanwhile, always seemed to be in cop mode.

It didn’t occur to Mae that, with a niece like her, Molly had a reason to always be in cop mode.

Mae knew Molly wasn’t a bad person, of course. She was slightly better than any other cop simply by virtue of being related to Mae. But Molly, even at her best moments, was incredibly unapproachable. The incident with the ghost and the cult was just one example of why Mae and Molly didn’t get along.

Hell, it had gotten so bad that Mae, for a while, had been convinced that Aunt Molly had been involved with the cult. Seeing her the day after their trip into the mines had eased those fears a little, though. Still, Aunt Molly and Mae’s relationship hadn’t magically improved in the time since then.

“Health class was kind of bullshit anyway,” Mae muttered. “All we learned about was, like, nutrition and abstinence.”

“Two of life’s essentials,” Bea quipped dryly.

The drive from the Ol’ Pickaxe to Mae’s house wasn’t a terribly long one. It was, however, long enough for awkward silences to settle in. Mae and Bea’s friendship was better than it had been in years, but even they had times when they couldn’t think of what to say. Mae had been looking out the window at the passing scenery when Bea finally spoke up.

“So, are you going to the party tomorrow night?”

Mae’s ears perked up at the mention of a party. Despite her pretty terrible history with them, Mae loved parties. They could be exhausting, but they were generally pretty fun. So long as nobody got puked on, that was.

“Party?” Mae questioned. “What? When? Where?”

“Tomorrow night,” Bea answered. “I just said it was tomorrow night. It’s out in the state forest, I guess. You seriously didn’t hear about this?”

Mae shook her head. “Gregg didn’t mention anything about a party.”

Bea nodded, apparently suddenly understanding. “Okay, yeah. Gregg probably wouldn’t know about this one. I don’t think him and Daryl Peach ever really hung out.”

Mae frowned in uncomprehending confusion. She was generally pretty good with names, but even she was drawing a blank when it came to ‘Daryl Peach’. It sounded vaguely familiar. Mae felt like he was probably someone from her graduating class, but not someone she had really associated with.

“Was he the guy who carried around that weird puppet?” Mae asked, grasping for straws.

“No, that was someone else,” Bea responded. “Daryl was in the marching band. He used to stand in front of the school and practice with his trombone while the buses pulled in.”

Ah, yes; now it was all coming back. Daryl was the trombone guy— the bane of her school day mornings. Daryl had practiced playing his trombone almost every day, but he had never really gotten any better. Mae could still remember sitting onboard the bus, waiting for it to unload, and hearing that terrible warbling coming from the yard.

Mae evidently hadn’t been the only person who wasn’t a fan of Daryl’s music, either. Back in junior year, an unknown hooligan (Or, in other words, Steve Scriggins) had stolen Daryl’s trombone and blew it up with a bunch of firecrackers. Daryl had been pretty miserable after that. Even Mae, who’d absolutely hated Daryl’s brass monstrosity, thought that blowing it up was cruel.

Mae had no idea what had happened to Daryl after graduation. She’d just assumed he’d gone off to wherever it was trombone players went to.

“Daryl Peach is throwing a party?” Mae asked in surprise.

“Well, the party’s for him,” Bea clarified. “He’s back in town for a couple weeks, and some of his friends thought they’d throw a party for his first night back. A lot of school people are gonna be there.”

Mae didn’t know if that was good or not. Most of the people who knew her from high school probably hated her—or, in the case of Andy Cullen, actively feared her. The only people Mae had kept up with after graduating were her close friends.

Well, them and Mr. Chazokov, but Mae wasn’t sure he counted. He was a teacher who literally lived up the street from her.

“I dunno,” Mae sighed. “I mean, I didn’t really know Daryl or his friends. Things might be super weird or awkward. I’ll have to think about this.”

Bea shrugged and returned her focus to the road. “Well, if it helps at all, I know for a fact that Cole won’t be there.”

“I’m in,” Mae said, speaking so quickly that the two words blended together into one.

“Oh. Wow,” Bea said. She sounded a little bit startled.

Mae didn’t bother clarifying. Bea knew perfectly well why an absence of Cole would be such a positive. A party without Cole was a party where Mae could be 100% certain that she wouldn’t puke on/near anyone she’d once been super into. That sort of guarantee was the deciding factor that Mae needed when making plans.

It wasn’t that Mae hated Cole, of course. In theory, Cole was fine. In practice, however, he was a living embodiment of one of the worst nights of Mae’s life. Maybe one day Mae would get over the embarrassment and be able to have a casual conversation with him. That would probably happen sometime around their third or fourth high school reunion. For now, though, Mae didn’t want to be anywhere near the guy.

This was pretty much the opposite of how Mae had felt back in high school…

* * *

  
_“… And anyway, that’s why I think anyone riding one of those hoverboard things should be shot,” Casey said as he, Gregg, and Mae walked down the hall._

_The high school that Mae and her friends went to was old. It was, in the words of Gregg Lee, ‘Old as balls’. It was also severely understaffed, woefully underfunded, and partially underground after a sinkhole had opened in one of the classrooms. The closest thing the school had to a claim to fame was its football team, and even their glory days were long behind them._

_Despite all of this, the school had a healthy number of students. The halls were fairly crowded as the group made their way to Mae’s locker. Nobody paid them much mind. Everyone was occupied with getting their stuff together and going home. People generally didn’t notice Mae or her friends unless they were causing trouble._

_Of course, they tended to cause trouble a lot. Right now, though, they all just wanted to get back to Casey’s place for band practice._

_Gregg and Casey both waited at Mae’s sides as she opened up her locker. Bags of chips spilled out onto the floor carelessly. Mae had no idea where those things had come from. She was really only interested in getting her chemistry textbook, even though she wouldn’t be using it or doing her homework._

_“Angus showed me a video of some guys goofing around on one of those hoverboards,” Gregg mused. “I was thinking of trying one out.”_

_“Gregg, I will lose all respect for you if you do that,” Casey said sternly. “I’ll lose respect for you, Angus will dump you, and your mother will disown you. These things will happen if you set foot on a hoverboard.”_

_Mae wasn’t interested in all this talk of hoverboards that didn’t hover. Her mind had drifted off after a long, boring day of school. It wasn’t until there was a sudden change in topic that she tuned back into the conversation._

_“Hey, Mae,” Gregg said, “Cole’s over there.”_

_Mae froze, still bent down and with her head in her locker._

_Cole had the locker across the hall from Mae, and the two had had the same homeroom since sophomore year. They weren’t good friends or anything, but Mae felt like they got along pretty well. Over the years they’d gotten to know each other, Mae had come to the conclusion that there was definitely some sort of vibe going on between them._

_She wasn’t positive, of course. Mae had been attracted to plenty of people, real and imaginary, over the years. She was very familiar with the feeling of being into someone. But as far as Mae knew, nobody had ever been attracted to her. People treated her with either disinterest, or, after the softball incident, suspicion and anger._

_Cole was always friendly, though. Granted, he was friendly with everyone, but he always looked like he was happy to see Mae. According to Casey, who had the most dating experience of anyone in their group, Cole was ‘a total dork’ for her._

_Mae had resolved to talk to Cole about the possible thing that was going on between them. But she kept forgetting, or losing her nerve, or getting sent to the nurse’s office, and she hadn’t gotten a chance yet._

_Now, however, Mae was feeling confident._

_Mae finished packing up her backpack and closed her locker door. She stood up straight, took a deep breath, and turned in the direction of Cole’s locker._

_Cole, like Mae, was stuffing textbooks into his backpack. Cole was in a bunch of AP classes, and that meant he had to do a lot more homework. A heavy backpack was just another one of the downsides to being good at school. Mae was happy with her backpack full of unread textbooks and old snack cakes._

_“You not gonna chicken out this time?” Casey whispered as he leaned against the locker behind him. He had a small smirk on his face. Mae kind of wanted to slap him._

_“No,” Mae whispered determinedly. “I’m gonna walk over there, look him in the eye, and ask him if he wants to buy me a pizza.”_

_“That could go well! But also he might just think you’re trying to mug him,” Gregg pointed out._

_“Didn’t Angus think you were trying to mug him when you first hit on him?” Mae asked. “I mean, that worked out. You two seem to be doing pretty well.”_

_“I think Angus is still convinced I’m going to mug him,” Gregg said sadly._

_“That’s the sort of problem everyone has in the beginning of a relationship,” Casey said, nodding sagely. Casey reached a hand up and gave Mae a motivational pat on the back. He hit her too hard, though, and Mae stumbled forward a bit. Mae would repay him for this later, tenfold._

_Mae gathered all of the resolve and confidence she had and began approaching Cole. She wasn’t really sure what she’d say when she finally reached him. Mae quickly regretted not rehearsing this in her head during one of her earlier, less important classes, like English or Life Skills._

_Cole had finished putting his books in his bag, and was closing up his locker. Mae hastily made an attempt to look attractive, or at least like someone who cleaned their clothes more than once a month. She ran her hands through her hair, stood up straight, and tried to adopt a casual stance. She wound up looking mostly kind of lopsided._

_Cole turned around, and at first seemed startled by how close Mae was standing to him. A look of pleasant surprise quickly appeared on his face. Mae smiled back, trying to do her best to appear as if she wasn’t trying too hard to smile._

_“Whoa, hey!” Cole said with a laugh._

_“Hey, I’m Mae!” Mae said, also laughing._

_“Yeah, I know!” Cole said, doubling down on the previous laughter._

_“Oh, god, this is already going downhill so fast,” Casey muttered._

_Mae folded her arms over her chest, holding them tight to herself. She tried to think of what to say next, but for some reason she could only think about Cole’s trucker hat. Where had he gotten that thing? Was it meant to be an ironic fashion statement? Or did Cole have dreams of one day riding across the country in a big old truck?_

_“The pizza!” Gregg’s whispering attempt at coaching came in loud and clear from behind Mae. “Ask him about the pizza!”_

_“Do you have any pizza?” Mae blurted out._

_Mae could practically feel the mortified expressions on Gregg and Casey’s faces._

_“Sorry? What was that?” Cole, thankfully, sounded as if he hadn’t heard Mae’s blunder. Mae silently thanked whatever God there might be out there for her poor enunciation._

_“I was asking if you wanted to get pizza sometime,” Mae said. “At Pastabilities—not the diner. Obviously. The diner has dumpster pizza.”_

_Cole’s face lit up as he realized what Mae was asking him. The future co-victim of the worst prom night ever smiled and nodded._

_“That sounds great, Mae!” A thought occurred to Cole as he reached up and adjusted his glasses. “Oh, I can’t tonight, though. I’ve got family stuff. But maybe we could go out this Saturday?”_

_Hearing Cole actually say the words ‘go out’ felt weirdly surreal to Mae. She’d never really been in a relationship—not since preschool, at least, and that one didn’t count. Mae had honestly expected this to go a whole lot worse than it had._

_Cole smiled and raised a hand in a small wave. As he turned and began walking towards the exit of the school, Mae let out a deep sigh of relief. She took a few steps backwards and joined Gregg and Casey at her locker, leaning against the metal doors for support._

_“I did it,” Mae whispered, her eyes closed. “I’m the datemaster.”_

_“I’ve gotta admit, that didn’t go nearly as bad as I was expecting,” Casey said. He sounded so genuinely impressed that it was offensive. “I mean, you didn’t punch him or throw up or anything.”_

_“Dude, you finally did it!” Gregg said excitedly. “This is awesome! We should celebrate by going up into Casey’s treehouse and throw bricks at his bio-dad’s car!”_

_Mae opened her mouth to reply. A sudden, brassy trumpeting noise from down the hall cut her off._

_“Hey, everyone!” Daryl Peach screamed joyously. “I got a new trombone!”_

* * *

  
Mae blinked. Looking back on it, it had all started so innocently— just a bunch of eating pizza and playing video games. Come to think of it, Mae and Cole had never really done anything that Mae hadn’t done with her other friends. Cole had just been a friend that Mae had wanted to smooch.

Now, though, the very idea of Cole gave Mae some pretty scary flashbacks. It was pretty safe to say that Mae was over Cole, or at least too traumatized to ever be attracted to him. Either possibility was likely.

Anyway, dating and romance weren’t Mae’s number one priority. They never had been. Mae doubted she’d be too interested in romance unless she ran into the Bombshell again, or unless Fiasco Fox somehow came to life and wooed her.

Wait, why was Mae thinking about this again?

“Hey, Mae?” Bea asked from the driver’s side seat. It only now occurred to Mae that the car was no longer moving. They were parked outside of Mae’s house.

“You’ve been sitting there for, like, five minutes,” Bea said, slightly worried. “Everything okay?”

Mae reached out and opened the passenger side door. “Yeah, sorry. Just got lost in my head a little bit.”

It was a little bit more than that, though. As Bea wished Mae goodnight, Mae realized that the reason she’d gotten so absorbed in that memory wasn’t because of Cole. It had been because of Casey.

Mae only had so many memories of Casey. She wouldn’t be making any new ones, either. This treasure hunt Casey had set up was as close as Mae would come to hanging out with her deceased friend one last time. This only served to make Mae even more resolved to find the buried lockbox.

After the party tomorrow, of course.


	3. The Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gang goes to a party. A mom joke gets made. A party gets ruined.

Gregg liked parties. He was a party dude. If there was a party, Gregg was going to try and get into it. Sometimes this led to problems, like the time Gregg crashed his cousin’s (Not Jen, the cool one; the other one, who was a felon) birthday party.

But Gregg wasn’t the kind of cool guy who’d let a few problems keep him from a party. That was why, when Mae told him about Dylan Peach’s secret forest party, Gregg was 100% down for it.

Gregg barely had any idea who Daryl Peach was. He didn’t really have the others’ memory for names. Half the time, Gregg couldn’t even remember his own parents’ names. But not knowing who someone was wasn’t a good reason to not go to a party being held in their honor.

It was nearly eight when Bea pulled up to the apartment. Mae was already in the passenger seat, which meant Gregg and Angus had the whole back of the car to themselves. That meant they could make out, or, more likely, goof around on Angus’s phone. There was no reception, but there were still some nice games on it.

They were halfway to the forest when Bea finally asked the big question.

“Okay, do any of you guys actually know Daryl?” Bea asked. She glanced up into the rearview mirror to try and get a look at all of her passengers. “Would he even know any of your names?”

“Pretty much everyone knows my name,” Mae pointed out. “I think I’d feel better if he didn’t recognize me.”

There was an awkward silence. Angus, thankfully, was the one to speak up and break it.

“I had home ec with him in senior year. We never really talked, though.”

Gregg slowly came to the realization that everyone was waiting on him to answer. He didn’t want to flat out admit he had no idea who Daryl was. That would be kind of improper. At the same time, though, he didn’t want to lie about it.

“Let’s see…” Gregg said, grasping at straws. “Was he the guy who carried around that weird puppet?”

“Okay, so none of you know him.” Bea said matter-of-factly.

“Why’s it a big deal if we know who Dylan Peaches is?” Mae asked. “Do _you_ know him, Beatrice?”

“I know him well enough to know his name’s Daryl,” Bea said. “Aside from that, though, I mostly know him through his cousin. She’s the one who put this whole welcome-back thing together for him. Remember Erika?”

“Our school had, like, five girls named Erika,” Gregg pointed out. “How is anyone supposed to keep up with that many Erika’s?”

Gregg himself was no stranger to having the same first name as someone else. Thankfully, he had the extra G in there, but that didn’t stop Gregg from getting mixed up with Greg Wembley, or Greg ‘Coffins’ Andersson. That had happened a lot back in school. It didn’t happen anymore, thankfully—Wembley had gone off to college, and Coffins had gotten his name changed in prison.

“Wait, I remember her,” Mae said thoughtfully. “She was a cheerleader, right? Dyed her hair pink and then immediately tried to wash it out?”

“You remember all that, but you can’t remember Daryl’s name immediately after I tell it to you?” Bea sighed.

“Yeah, that was her. Anyway, she’s the one who told me about the party. I messaged her last night, and she said it was cool to bring you guys.”

“Is anyone else we know going?” Angus asked.

Gregg, who had basically tuned out of the conversation, was bouncing his legs up and down as the nighttime scenery whizzed by. He was anxious, impatient, and, most importantly, dying to get wasted and embarrass himself in front of the Cap’n.

“Well, Jackie’s definitely going to be there,” Bea said.

A low, mortified moan came from the passenger seat. “Oh, no,” Mae grumbled in dread. “She hates me.”

“I don’t think she’s still mad about that party we went to.” Bea said quickly. “I mean, she’s mad at you about a lot of other stuff, but I cleared that party thing up. So long as you don’t do anything stupid…”

Bea trailed off worriedly. From the look Mae was giving her, it appeared they both suspected that that piece of advice was kind of futile.

Gregg, personally, didn’t understand how anyone could hate Mae. He had the utmost respect for Jackie, but Mae was great. She could eat more sliders in one sitting than anyone else Gregg knew. He was probably a little bit biased, considering they’d been best friends since pre-K, but Mae was awesome.

While Bea and Mae kept talking about Jackie and bombs or whatever, Gregg leaned against Angus. He wanted to calm himself down before the party started. Luckily for Gregg, his boyfriend was a very chill guy.

Angus put an arm around Gregg almost instinctively. He knew how energetic Gregg could get. Cuddling helped him settle down, but it was also just nice to do in general.

Gregg would probably be too drunk to cuddle after the party, though.

* * *

 

  
Parties had definitely changed as Mae grew up. Half of them took place outdoors instead of in a friend’s backyard. Decorations were nearly non-existent. Guitar-playing douchebags had become much more common than clowns or magicians.

Not that Mae was complaining, of course. Those parties had been perfectly fine for Little Mae. Adult Mae, however, wanted to enjoy a stimulating social event with likeminded adults.

“Mae, stop eating all of the cheese curls. We literally just got here.”

Mae had already been reaching for another handful of cheese curls when Bea chastised her. The bowl someone had set up next to the beer keg was already almost empty. Mae would have proclaimed her innocence, but the orange dust on her hands and mouth were a dead giveaway.

The setup for this party was pretty okay. There was a fire, thankfully, to fight against the February cold. Someone—Erika, presumably—had set up some snacks. The only drink option, however, was a keg of beer that Mae was desperately trying to avoid. A guitar douchebag had already set up by the fire, and was trying his best to appear folksy.

Gregg had snatched up a few cups of beer and was off somewhere with Angus. This left Mae and Bea alone with a bunch of people from high school that Mae could barely remember.

And Jackie.

Mae had always been intimidated by Jackie. Even in grade school, she’d been an intense kid. Getting into social justice and political activism had only served to stoke the fires of Jackie’s righteous fury. Bea insisted that Jackie was a lot of fun when she wasn’t being serious, but the closest Mae had come to seeing that was at the party she’d ruined last year.

Bea and Jackie pretty much immediately buddied up and were off talking by the fire. Jackie either hadn’t noticed Mae, or didn’t want to talk to her. Both options seemed likely.

Mae scanned the crowd of people who’d gathered in the woods. There were quite a few familiar faces. She couldn’t put names to all of them, but she still knew all of these people. Seeing them all gathered in one place gave Mae a weird feeling of nostalgia.

Mae approached the fire, hoping to get into a conversation with Gregg and Angus. Before she reached them, though, she was sidelined by a voice calling out to her.

“Mae? Mae Borowski?”

Mae didn’t immediately recognize the voice. She’d never spoken much to its owner, after all. If the person speaking had instead been making awful trombone noises, though, Mae would have immediately recognized him. Mae had to get a good look at the person talking to her to realize that it was Daryl Peach.

Daryl Peach hadn’t changed much since graduation. He was a little bit taller, and seemed to be a fair bit stockier. It looked as if he hadn’t shaved in a while. He was wearing some sort of army jacket—Mae could vaguely remember Daryl had signed up with the military after graduation. Aside from that, though, he had the same oblivious smile he’d had back in school.

“Hey, Daryl,” Mae said with a small smile. She figured it would be smart to be friendly with the guy the party was being thrown for.

“What’re you doing here?” Daryl asked. He sounded genuinely confused, as if Mae was supposed to be in Jamaica or something.

Mae sighed and dug up that familiar answer to that familiar question. “I dropped out of college last year. I’m back in Possum Springs.”

Daryl blinked. “No, I mean what’re you doing here? Like, I’m not upset you’re at this party; it’s just surprising.”

“Oh.” Mae blinked. “Bea told me about the party. Your cousin invited her, I guess.”

“Oh, okay,” Daryl said thoughtfully. “Yeah, I’m just surprised to see you here. Me and you never really hung out.”

There was a reason for that. Mae had been terrified that, if she associated with Daryl, she’d be subjected to his trombone-playing much more often. Now, Mae wasn’t exactly a musical prodigy herself—but being bad at bass and bad at a trombone were two very different things.

Mae shook her head, trying to get her mind off of trombones. “So, you still in the army?”

“Air Force, actually,” Daryl corrected. “I just got back from overseas. Looking forward to relaxing a little.”

Mae’s eyes widened in surprise. “Whoa, the Air Force? Do you get to fly a plane?”

A small, amused smile appeared on Daryl’s face. “No, no. I work with ground vehicles, mostly, and play in a regional band. Not everyone in the Air Force flies a plane.”

Mae’s surprise and amazement turned into confused disappointment. “That’s stupid,” she said. “Everyone in the Air Force should do, you know, air stuff. Otherwise, why call it the Air Force?”

Daryl just nodded enigmatically. “I’ll be sure to ask that question when I’m back on-duty. I’m sure no one in the Air Force has ever been asked that before.”

Mae didn’t say anything, but felt a sense of pride in knowing her questions would reach the top brass of America’s military. It didn’t occur to her that Daryl was being sarcastic. To Mae, there was nothing to be sarcastic about.

Mae exchanged a nod of parting with Daryl and wandered back towards the bonfire. Gregg had apparently moved onto a fresh cup of beer, and was laughing and joking with Angus. Mae hurried towards her two friends and sat beside them. The sounds of conversation and douchey guitar were filling the air.

“Heya, Mae!” Gregg exclaimed as Mae joined them by the fire. He looked like he was already a little tipsy, and was leaning against Angus for support. Mae couldn’t help but think that being drunk looked like fun; she wasn’t willing to take the risk, though.

“Party’s kind of off to a slow start, huh?” Mae said. She took a seat on an overturned log facing the fire. Mae didn’t know if the log had already been there, or if Daryl’s cousin had overturned a tree all on her own. Mae wanted to believe it was the second option.

“Things’ll liven up eventually,” Angus said reassuringly. “I mean, we’ve been here for less than ten minutes. More people will probably show up soon.”

Mae shrugged. There were already a good number of people at the party. Most of them were just sort of huddled together into little cliques, talking and laughing. None of them really seemed like party people, though. Daryl Peach evidently associated with a pretty low-key crowd.

The fire continued to crackle, and the douchebag continued to play his guitar. The acoustic version of a semi-popular pop song from the late 2000’s filled the air. Just as Mae started wishing that someone would come and liven things up, she heard a voice. Unlike Daryl’s voice, Mae recognized this one immediately.

That wasn’t a good thing, however.

“’Sup, ladies?”

* * *

 

  
Erika Larsen, the cousin of famed trombonist Daryl Peach, was another Possum Strings success story. Like Bea, she’d been an enthusiastic student with dreams of going to college. Also like Bea, reality had put those dreams on hold indefinitely.

Erika’s family wasn’t exactly well-to-do. Economically, college simply hadn’t been an option. That meant that Erika’s only real hope for getting into college had been a scholarship. Despite her best efforts, though, Erika just hadn’t made the cut. Someone with better grades or better connections had beaten her to the punch.

Things had only gotten tougher after graduation, too. Numerous complications, including a surprise pregnancy, had led to Erika, becoming a lot older in the last two years. Suffice to say, Bea was actually surprised that Erika had actually had the time to put together the party for her cousin, let alone attend it.

Erika had arrived with Daryl shortly after Bea and the gang. While Daryl went off to mingle with people who barely remembered him, Erika joined Jackie and Bea at the edge of the party. Erika wasn’t exactly best friends with Jackie or Bea, but the three were friendly enough that they could hang out.

“God, this beer’s awful,” Jackie commented while the party picked up in the background. She was very slowly working on a red plastic cup of beer. “It’s skunky and watered down as hell. Who got this stuff?”

“The beer was Levy’s job,” Erika sighed. She looked tired, Bea thought; she always looked tired. Then again, Bea always felt tired herself.

“Levy’s smart enough to grow his own weed, but he doesn’t know not to leave beer in the trunk of his car all week?” Jackie asked skeptically. “Wait, no; it’s freezing out. If he left the beer in his car, it wouldn’t be warm. What the hell happened to this beer?”

Bea laughed as she chewed on the end of her dummy cigarette. Covertly, she glanced over her shoulder and scanned the crowd for Mae. Bea was relieved to see that Mae was talking with Gregg and Angus, and hadn’t gotten into any trouble so far. Content for the time being, Bea returned to the conversation.

“So, what’ve you girls been up to lately?” Erika asked. “I mean, aside from work and college or whatever.”

Jackie groaned theatrically. “I’ve been so busy. Some jackass at my school’s been creeping on some students, and I’ve been trying to do something about that. Haven’t had the time to throw one of my parties in a while.”

That was true. Jackie hadn’t held one of her famous Jackie Parties since the one in November. That was probably a blessing in disguise, though. The more time passed, the more Jackie would calm down about what had happened that night. Then, Bea could bring Mae to the next party.

Hopefully. Bea wasn’t too optimistic. Mae had matured a little bit since that party, but some things can’t be fixed just by learning a lesson. Mae still had poor impulse control, and still tended to say things she probably shouldn’t. Mae attending a party was like bringing a flamethrower to an oil rig.

This party was sort of a trial run. If Mae could get through it without puking on someone, Bea would feel better about bringing her to a Jackie Party.

“What about you, Bea?” Erika asked tiredly. “Anything interesting going on?”

If Bea wasn’t so tired and the question wasn’t so sad, she would’ve laughed. Work kept her so busy that the most interesting thing in her life lately was hammers. Really, the only thing of note that had happened recently was Mae finding that note from Casey. That was hardly something worth bringing up, though.

“Not particularly,” Bea sighed.

For a while, the three girls were quiet. Jackie took another reluctant sip of her beer, her face scrunching up as she did so. When she looked up from her drink, her eyes were drawn to something behind Bea.

“Wait. Who’s that guy over there?”

Bea turned around to see who Jackie was looking at. It wasn’t very difficult to find him, either; he looked fairly out of place. A tall, stern-looking man in his late 30’s stood at the edge of the party. He was bundled up in an old, flannel coat, and had what looked like a tribal tattoo on the left side of his face.

The older man’s focus was on the partygoers gathered around the fire. He looked as if he was scanning the crowd, trying to find something.

“Is he someone’s dad?” Erika asked obliviously. “Or, like… a forest ranger?”

“Ugh,” Jackie groaned. “The guy looks like a total dealer. Erika, do you want me to go over there and tell him to get out of here?”

“How do you know what a dealer looks like?” Bea asked worriedly.

“I go to college and party at clubs, Bea; it’d be weird if I hadn’t seen any drug dealers.” Jackie shrugged mater-of-factly before hugging herself for warmth.

Erika opened her mouth to answer Jackie’s question, but a noise cut her off. It was loud, sudden, and nearly gave Bea a heart attack. It was swiftly followed by another, and another, with no sign of stopping. For the briefest of possible moments, Bea couldn’t identify the noise.

Then, when she turned and looked in Mae’s direction, she knew what it had been.

* * *

 

  
“’Sup, ladies?”

Steve. Effing. Scriggins.

Mae didn’t turn around. She didn’t even want to look at this goddamn clown.

Mae had always hated Scriggins; this was no secret. The guy had always been bad news. The fact that he wasn’t in jail right now was just another reason to hate the police. Instead of rotting away in a cell and forgetting about life on the outside, Steve was out in the woods, ruining Mae’s night.

“What’re you doing out here, Steve?” Gregg asked in confusion.

“Your mom,” Steve retorted.

Mae groaned with displeasure as Scriggins walked into her view. He stood in the middle of the group, looking at them smugly. Mae had no idea what in the world Steve had to be smug about—he was basically a dumpster-man. From what Mae could tell, not even Steve’s friends liked him.

“You always make that joke when people ask what you’re doing,” Gregg said, frowning. “You need to stop doing that. Mom jokes stopped being funny in junior year, Steve.”

Steve scoffed. He glanced towards Mae, who realized with great displeasure that he was about to start talking to her.

“You seriously showed up to this thing?” He asked mockingly. “Didn’t you throw up in front of your girlfriend at that other party?”

At first, Mae had no idea what Steve was talking about. It took her a moment to get that he was trying to be sexist and/or homophobic. Insults that took a while to register weren’t really that effective. All that Steve’s comment managed to do was A), make Mae hate Steve more; and B), remind Mae that having a girlfriend would probably be pretty nice.

“You showed up to this thing, too.” Mae grumbled. “Why’d you even come? Who could have possibly invited you?”

Steve dropped his smug grin and stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets. “Levy told me about this party. Didn’t tell me it was for Daryl Effing Peach, though. Like I care about that guy and his tuba.”

“It’s not a tuba; it’s a trumpet,” Mae corrected.

Steve scoffed once more. “Same difference.”

Mae glared irritably at Scriggins. Either he didn’t notice, or he thought her disdain was amusing. Most likely the latter.

“Anyway, I show up, and Levy’s not even here,” Steve said, speaking mostly to Gregg and Angus. “Can you believe it? Dumbass is probably off getting wasted somewhere in town while I’m stuck at this lame-ass party. Ain’t even any grunge music playing. God damn.”

Mae rolled her eyes. She wanted to get up and go somewhere else, but then Gregg and Angus would be all alone with this asshole. What kind of friend would Mae be if she left them both behind to get Scriggined?

Although Steve was right about one thing: the music at the party was terrible. The guitar douchebag’s songs just kept getting douchier and douchier. Between Steve and the music, Mae’s patience was running out fast.

“What do you even want, Steve?” Mae asked irritably. “Why are you even talking to us?”

Any mirth in Steve’s expression slowly faded away. He took a moment to glance over his shoulder, as if looking for someone. Mae saw that Steve seemed to be checking on an older guy in flannel at the edge of the party. After a moment, Steve turned his attention back to Mae’s group.

“Okay, here’s the deal,” Steve whispered cautiously. “Did Hartley talk to any of you before he skipped town? I need to find something he left behind.”

Mae found herself unable to find the words she wanted to say. Steve’s sudden serious tone had caught her completely off-guard. Was he talking about the lockbox full of money? How could Steve possibly know about that?

And, most importantly, did this mean Casey had seriously buried a bunch of money somewhere in town?

Mae had a lot of questions. She only managed to ask one of them.

“You knew Casey?” Mae asked in genuine surprise.

If Steve was going to seriously answer Mae’s question, he never got a chance. As soon as Mae had asked her question, a noise Mae hadn’t heard in years drowned out everything else. All conversation stopped, and everyone’s eyes turned towards the source of the awful sound.

Daryl was standing beside the guitar douchebag, who had stopped playing his douchebag guitar. He was glaring angrily at Daryl, who was obliviously blowing into a large, shiny trombone. The uniquely terrible sound of someone who can’t play the trombone filled the forest clearing, scaring the animals and making everyone sad.

“God damn it!” Steve screamed, hands clenched over his ears. “I thought I got rid of that effing thing!”

A chorus of complaints rose up in response to Daryl’s attempt at jamming. The guitar douchebag, who Daryl had apparently been trying to play along with, picked up his instrument and left in a huff. All the while, Daryl kept trying and failing to play something related to music.

And Mae was just glad that, for once, she hadn’t been the one to ruin a party.

* * *

 

  
“Well, that was a bust,” Bea said.

The party had come to an almost immediate end after Daryl had fished out his trombone. Even Erika, the party’s organizer and Daryl’s cousin, had been ready to abandon ship. People had protested, and even tried to get Daryl to stop, but nothing had worked. The party died, and the night belonged to the trombone.

Mae and the gang had stuck around for a while just in case things got better, but eventually they piled into Bea’s car and left. For all Mae knew, everyone had just left Daryl behind to play his trombone.

“I’ve never seen so many people leave a party so fast,” Mae said as the lights of Possum Springs became visible in the distance. “Not even at that New Year’s party where the building caught on fire.”

“How is it that he was actually worse than he’d been back in high school?” Gregg asked from the back seat. “I mean, aren’t you supposed to get better with practice? We still suck, but we’ve gotten kind of better. A little.”

The car grew silent. Mae looked out the window at the passing buildings as they began to approach Towne Centre. As the last echoes of Daryl’s trombone exited Mae’s skull, her mind drifted back to Steve’s question. More than anything else, it had been how serious he’d been when he asked it that really got to Mae. He’d almost seemed worried.

Mae tried to get her mind off of it. The more she thought about it, the more this deal with Casey’s lockbox seemed shady. The possible addition of Scriggins into the mix only made things shadier.

Whatever. This was probably nothing. Steve was most-likely just trying to steal something of Casey’s, right? After all, Casey and Scriggins had barely known each other. Casey had had no reason to hang out with a criminal like Steve.

Casey had been good. He hadn’t been the kind of person those guys in the mine thought he was. Mae didn’t believe anything about Casey working with his cousin, just like she hadn’t believed the rumors about him in high school. Mae knew who Casey had been better than any of those other people.

Right?

The car pulled up to Gregg and Angus’s apartment building. A few moments later, Bea and Mae were alone in the car. Moody music played from the radio, the volume turned down low. Mae's eyes remained focused on the passing lights outside the car.

Bea glanced curiously over at Mae before returning her eyes to the road. “Sorry that party didn’t really work out.”

Mae didn’t turn to look at Bea. The landmarks outside, all recognizable, were guiding them closer to the Borowski household. Mae imagined that her parents would be surprised to see her home early. They’d probably be surprised to see she hadn’t come home because she was drunk or sad, too.

“It’s alright. We’ve both been to worse parties.”

Bea chuckled. “Yeah,” she said. “Though this was the first party I’ve been to that was ruined by a wind instrument.”

Oddly enough, it hadn’t been Mae’s first party that had been ruined by a wind instrument. But that was a college story, and Mae was sick of talking about college.

As the car stopped moving and they pulled up to the front curb of Mae’s house, Mae looked up at the starry night sky. Longest Night had come and gone, and the days were slowly getting longer. The hot months would be coming up; the trees would all be green again.

Even if things in Possum Springs stayed the same, they still changed.

“Hey, Bea?” Mae asked quietly.

“Yeah?” Bea raised an eyebrow. She didn’t say anything about it, but it was pretty clear she was confused about why Mae wasn’t getting out of the car.

“When we go on our road trip, do you think we’ll go to any parties out there?”

Bea shrugged. “I guess. There’ll always be more parties, Mae.”

Mae, who was starting to feel weirdly melancholic, smiled. That was a nice thought. There always would be more parties. Something about that was good. Something about that made Mae tear up a little.

“Yeah,” Mae sighed. “Yeah.”


	4. The Job

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In this incredibly plot-critical chapter, Mae struggles with looking for a job. The most important character finally shows up.

Mae stared listlessly at her laptop’s computer screen.

The Careers page on the Ham Panther website was pretty standard fare for online applications. In the last few weeks, Mae had become fairly familiar with the layout of these things. There were always pictures of smiling, photogenic employees helping customers, looking over merchandise, or staring at something that was off-camera. There was always paragraph after paragraph about the opportunities a minimum wage job with their company could lead to.

The specifics might be different, but the layout was usually the same.

Mae’s New Year’s resolution had been to get a job… if she got around to it. She hadn’t really taken the resolution seriously. After all, weren’t New Year’s resolutions just things people said and then never did? Nobody actually started going to the gym more or eating better; they just brought their resolutions up if anyone asked.

But the more Mae had thought about it, the more seriously she took it. It wasn’t that Mae wanted to work—nobody really wanted to work—but she felt like it would be a good thing to look into. Her parents were having money problems, after all, and pierogis usually didn’t pay for themselves.

That was assuming Mae could even get a job. Back in college, she’d bagged groceries—that hadn’t lasted long. Mae doubted her old managers would be willing to give her a glowing endorsement, either. That left Mae with no experience to put down, and without experience, odds of getting a job were slim.

How were you supposed to get job experience if nobody wanted to hire anyone without it?

Ham Panther had been Mae’s last choice. She didn’t really want to apply to Hamp Panther. Employees seemed to have nothing but horror stories about the place. On top of that, the inside of a Ham Panther always felt off, somehow. Mae was 90% certain that every Ham Panther was in some way haunted.

Not that you’d be able to tell that from the pictures Ham Panther used for their website. The people in the pictures all looked like they were way too happy to actually be working. They were probably actors, or models, or both.

Mae sighed. She’d been staring at the web page for, like, five minutes. Just staring at it wasn’t going to get Mae the awful job she needed.

Mustering her courage, Mae moved her cursor over to the large, colorful, ‘APPLY HERE’ button.

The application process, like the webpage itself, was par for the course; page after page of personal information, education history, and questions about the army that Mae was able to just click through. The questionnaire portion of the application was the only part that Mae really needed to pay attention to.

_Question 1: Do you consider yourself the sort of person who thrives in a position of leadership?_

Mae frowned. She had no idea what this question had to do with stocking shelves. Moreover, Mae had no idea how someone would know this about themselves.

Thinking about it, Mae guessed she was pretty okay at being a leader. But then again, she was really, really good at just going along with things. Sometimes when she hung out with Gregg or Germ, she wouldn’t even know what they were doing until the day was over.

With a shrug, Mae clicked the bubble next to the ‘Maybe’ option and continued on down the list.

_Question 6: A manager has given instructions on how to complete a task. You are aware of a way to complete the task that is safer and more efficient. What do you do?_

Mae thought that the answer to this one was pretty straightforward. Then again, sometimes the answer that these things wanted wasn’t the one you’d think. Mae took a quick look over the options and tried to think like a big conglomerate.

If she were Ham Panther, how would she want the people inside of her to act?

Mae clicked the bubble next to the third option: ‘Follow the manager’s instructions. The supervisor got their job by knowing better than you.’ The answer didn’t feel right, but it did feel like something that people in charge would enjoy hearing.

Mae continued on.

_Question 9: A trolley is running out of control and is about to run over a Ham Panther customer. You can pull a lever to make the trolley switch tracks. However, on the other track are several of your fellow Ham Panther employees. Do you pull the lever?_

Okay, these questions were getting a little weird now.

The trolley problem was about the only thing in philosophy that Mae really knew about. She hadn’t expected to see it on a job application, though. Thinking about how to answer this one was giving Mae a headache.

Mae skipped on ahead and checked the next question.

_Question 10: If asked, would you **kill** for Ham Panther?_

That was enough job application for today. Mae quickly exited the webpage and closed her laptop.

Maybe she needed some sun.

* * *

 

  
The best place to get some sun was, of course, the Ol’ Pickaxe.

Well, really, Mae just wanted to talk to Bea, and the Pickaxe was the only place to find her.

The Pickaxe, as usual, hadn’t been terribly busy. Mae was up a little earlier than usual, so she’d expected to see at least a few customers. When Mae entered the Pickaxe, though, the only people around were Bea and the repairman who drove the big truck.

The truck driver didn’t stick around for long, and soon it was just Mae and Bea. With no customers in sight, Mae was able to strike up a conversation. Bea politely (Well, more like tiredly) listened as Mae went over her job-search woes.

“I mean, it’s ridiculous,” Mae grumbled. “Why is finding a job so hard? Why can’t jobs just be, like, guaranteed? I keep sending in applications, but for some reason no one wants to hire me! I haven’t even gotten called in for an interview! Can you believe that?”

Bea blinked. “I’ll agree that finding a job is pretty difficult, but, I mean… you’re really unhireable. You’ve flat-out admitted to people that you regularly stole from the only job you’ve ever had.”

Mae couldn’t really argue with that. So instead of arguing, she just folded her arms and stared at Bea.

“Look, there are plenty of places around town where you could look for a town,” Bea pointed out. “I mean, that Dan guy changes jobs every few days. Just apply to the places he’s been fired from.”

Mae opened her mouth to speak, but Bea interrupted her.

“Except here,” she said quickly. “Don’t apply here. I love you like a sister, Mae, but I will never hire you.”

Mae had expected Bea to say that. The Pickaxe had been the first place that Mae had applied to—or, rather, tried to apply to. Bea had stopped Mae before she could even hand in her application. In the weeks since then, Bea’s opinion on hiring Mae hadn’t changed one bit.

“But I’m super responsible!” Mae exclaimed, fooling absolutely no one. “Remember last year when we went up to Mrs. Miranda’s house? I helped you fix that piece of shit furnace that had a face on it!”

Bea raised a single eyebrow at Mae’s recollection of events.

“No,” she said. “I fixed the furnace, and then you broke it so we could get out of the basement. If Mrs. Miranda hadn’t locked us in the basement, your only contribution would’ve been tying a bunch of garbage to a furnace.”

Mae scrunched up her face in a focused attempt to remember that night from last year. “I remember it differently,” she said.

This actually brought a small smile to Bea’s face. Mae was willing to bet that it wasn’t amusing enough to change Bea’s mind about hiring her, though.

“Look, if you ever prove me wrong about you being responsible, I’ll hire you in a heartbeat,” Bea said. “Until then, though, you could just do what Germ does.”

Mae frowned. “Hang out in a parking lot??”

Bea sighed irritably. She gave Mae a look that made it clear she wasn’t sure if Mae was joking or not. “No, I mean you could help me out unofficially. I’d pay you under the table if you help unload supplies or organize stuff.”

Mae briefly considered this. On the one hand, she’d love getting some money. Plus, it would be super satisfying to prove Bea wrong about Mae being responsible.

On the other hand, moving and organizing stuff sounded really bad and boring. Mae could just picture herself struggling to carry heavy tools or bags of rock salt. It made Mae’s muscles hurt just thinking about it. Mae was also pretty certain she’d get distracted and wind up trying to build something with all of the stuff in the back.

“Nah,” Mae decided. “I think I’ll look elsewhere.”

Bea scoffed. “Good to know you’re taking this seriously.”

But she was taking this seriously. Mae was taking this whole ‘job’ thing about as seriously as everything else. It just wasn’t really Mae’s number one priority. Mae had a lot of things she needed to do, after all, and finding a job wasn’t at the top of the list.

At the moment, Mae’s priorities looked like this:

1) Hang out with Gregg as much as possible before his big move to Bright Harbor.  
2) Deal with that whole ‘mental illness’ thing.  
3) Dig up Casey’s mysterious lockbox full of cash.  
4) Try and get in contact with the Bombshell from Jackie’s party.  
5) Get a job, probably.

Mae made a mental note to write that list down in her journal sometime. Or not. Whatever.

Bea glanced over at the clock that hung over the Pickaxe’s door. She sighed and returned her attention to Mae, her arms folded over her chest.

“Look, Mae, I really can’t stand around talking about this all day,” she said. “And I’m not really the best person to ask for advice about jobs, anyway. I didn’t exactly apply to work here. Isn’t there someone else who can help you out with this?”

Bea sounded fairly irritated, but Mae understood why. Mae was kind of bothering her at work. And even if Mae had literally never actually seen a single customer come in while Bea was working, Mae knew it wasn’t right to distract Bea.

Bea was right about the job thing, too. There was someone Mae could talk to about her job application woes. There was someone in town who had managed to land a job despite having problems just like Mae’s— someone who’d been exactly where Mae was right now.

An old friend, a kindred spirit, who would know just what to say.

* * *

 

  
The weather in Possum Springs was getting warmer, but it was still pretty cold. It was the kind of day that made Mae wish she had a car to ride around in instead of jumping all over town.

She didn’t want to drive, herself—she just wanted to ride around in someone else’s car. Preferably, a car that had satellite radio.

It wasn’t a very long walk from the Pickaxe to the Snack Falcon. Even with how easily Mae got distracted, it hadn’t taken more than a few minutes. Mae just hoped that she’d find who she was looking for, and wouldn’t have to walk around looking for them.

Mae walked through Snack Falcon’s door and stepped into the convenience store’s air conditioned interior. The Snack Falcon was always chilly—the snacks needed to be cold, apparently. Gregg seemed to be okay with the cold air, though. His leather jacket probably helped a lot.

As always, the Snack Falcon was pretty much empty. As Mae scanned the linoleum items, she quickly spotted the man she was looking for. He was standing by the slushee machine, filling an extra-large cup to the brim. The cup’s brightly-colored contents were spilling out over his hand, but he didn’t seem to mind.

Mae approached him, generic music playing over the loudspeaker. The two of them were pretty much the only people in the Snack Falcon, so Mae wasn’t too worried about being overheard. Not that she usually worried about that, anyway.

“Hey,” Mae said when she reached the slushee machine.

The store’s sole other occupant looked up at her and offered a short nod in greeting. He returned his attention to his overfilling cup.

Mae paused, uncertain. “So, look… I’m having some trouble with this whole job hunting thing. I was hoping you had some advice.”

He didn’t answer. For a while, the only noise was the sound of the slushee machine dispensing its syrupy contents. After a moment, the only other person in the Snack Falcon pulled his cup away from the dispenser. Without a word, he lifted the extra-large cup to his mouth and chugged its contents down in a matter of seconds. Mae watched all of this with a mixture of confusion, awe, and fear.

With an audible swallow and sigh, Mae’s friend finished downing his slushee. When he was finally done, he looked up at Mae and spoke.

“I’ve never had a job,” Germ said. “I’m 18.”

Mae blinked. “Oh,” she said. “For some reason I thought you had a job back in high school.”

“Nope,” Germ said. He placed his cup back in the slushee dispenser and began refilling it. Streams of multicolored slush poured from the dispenser, rapidly filling the massive cup Germ had procured.

“Huh,” Mae mused. “You know, on second thought, I should’ve asked Gregg for advice.”

“Yup,” Germ said.

Mae glanced around the empty Snack Falcon. She wasn’t entirely sure where to go from here.

The eerie sounds of convenience store muzak filled the shop. Without Gregg around to play rockabilly music or scream about parties, the Snack Falcon felt weirdly foreign. Snack Falcons were probably only a little less haunted than Ham Panthers.

“Wait, where is Gregg?” Mae asked.

“Eating lunch,” Germ said. “I’m watching the shop.” His eyes never left slushee machine.

Mae glanced at the cup Germ seemed to be entirely focused on. More and more slushee spilled out of Germ’s cup and splattered onto the linoleum floor. Did he not know he was putting too much in his cup? Did he simply not care? Wasn’t it too chilly for a slushee anyway?

Every time Mae hung out with Germ, she wound up having more questions than she’d had before.

Mae frowned thoughtfully. “Are you sure you’ve never had a job? I could’ve sworn you worked at the Food Donkey in high school.”

“No,” Germ said. “That doesn’t sound like me.”

“Oh, weird,” Mae muttered. “I must be thinking of somebody else.”

That was really the only possible explanation, now that Mae thought about it. After all, Mae hadn’t really started associating with Germ until after she’d dropped out of college. But still, who was it that Mae was thinking of? It was someone who’d stocked shelves at the Food Donkey, right? The more Mae thought about it, the more frustrating it became.

Mae began mentally cycling through the people who’d had jobs in high school. Beth Holstead? No, she’d worked at Pastabilities (RIP). Josh? Mae was pretty sure he’d just worked on his parents’ farm. Cindy Clark? She’d had a job, but stopped working there after the nose-ring incident. Levy? Mae didn’t know if what he did qualified as a job—it wasn’t legal, after all.

Mae sighed. Maybe this was just going to be one of those things she’d never remember, like how to multiply fractions, or her mom’s maiden name.

A red light on the slushee machine switched on as the last of the Wild Cherry flavor slushed into Germ’s cup. Mae waited patiently for Germ to down his third slushee, silently hoping he wouldn’t move on to another flavor. Thankfully, it seemed like Germ wasn’t in the mood to sample the Frosty Fiascola.

Mae decided to take a chance and ask Germ for advice on the whole job thing. There was always a chance he could offer some good advice. Or, at the very least, he could invite Mae over for sloppy joes again.

“So, I’ve been trying to find a job lately,” Mae said. “That hasn’t been working out.”

“Okay,” Germ said as he dropped his now-empty cup into the garbage bin.

Mae shrugged nonchalantly. “I dunno, maybe that’s a good thing. I honestly don’t know if I’m ready for a job. I start thinking about going to work and I get all panicky. It’s such a big change, you know? I’m bad with changes.”

“You gotta get better at it,” Germ said. “Can’t fight change. It’s inevitable. Everything changes.”

Mae laughed darkly. “Trust me, Germ, I already know all that. I don’t wanna fight change; I just wanna be better at dealing with it.”

Germ nodded as if he understood, but Mae felt like he didn’t. At this point, Germ was the only member of the group who didn’t know why Mae had dropped out of college. He didn’t know about the shapes, or about the disconnection from reality Mae had felt. Mae was perfectly okay with leaving Germ in the dark on that subject.

It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Germ, of course. He’d earned Mae’s trust that night when he helped get her friends out of the mine. But Mae didn’t know if she could really open up to Germ. She barely knew him, after all. All Mae really knew was that Germ had a dead brother and liked trampolines.

The guy was still kind of an enigma.

A thought occurred to Mae. While she hadn’t really hung out with Germ back in high school, Casey had—the two of them skated together. There was a chance that Germ might know about the lockbox. Hell, he might even know if there was actually any money in it, or even where it was buried.

“Hey, Germ?” Mae began. “You and Casey hung out after he graduated, right?”

“I used to skateboard with Casey out in the parking lots,” Germ said. “One time we got chased by a dog out there.”

Mae instinctively reached up and touched the spot where a dog had bitten off a chunk of her ear. It was something that she always did when she heard a story about a dog being crazy. Mae wasn’t afraid of dogs, but hearing those stories always made her have flashbacks.

Mae pulled her hand away from her ear and tried to clear her head. “Okay, so… did Casey ever mention anything about—”

“It was one of those big dogs,” Germ continued, interrupting her. “The really big ones. The ones that try and sit on your lap, but they get all over you.”

Mae blinked. “Uh… Okay?”

“It chased us for a while,” Germ said. “Kept trying to knock us off of our boards. We couldn’t leave the parking lot, ‘cause it would circle around us. Like it was herding us, you know?”

Mae didn’t say anything. This wasn’t the information she’d wanted, but now she was invested in the story.

Germ shrugged. “Casey ran away while the dog was chasing me. He ditched me in the parking lot. I ran from the dog for a while and then I didn’t get home until dark.”

There wasn’t really anything Mae could say to that. Most of the stories Germ told tended to end in confused silence. She sort of felt like she should apologize about the dog thing, but she didn’t really know why.

Mae was so thrown off by Germ’s story that she nearly forgot what she’d been trying to ask him. She quickly pushed Germ’s story aside and tried to mentally refocus.

“Okay,” Mae said. “So, do you know if Casey—”

“I have to go now,” Germ said.

Mae could only let out a tiny stammer of confusion before Germ walked away. Mae watched as the young man walked slowly and steadily towards the Snack Falcon’s exit, not even bothering to stop for the automatic doors. The doors clicked shut behind him, and soon Germ had disappeared down the street, towards the Food Donkey.

It occurred to Mae that she should probably be more upset when Germ just up and left in the middle of a conversation like that. It was kind of hard to get mad at Germ, though. He was like some sort of alien who didn’t play by society’s rules.

Wait. Holy shit, was Germ an alien? Were he and his family secretly extraterrestrial infiltrators? It would definitely explain a lot.

No, wait—that was really stupid.

Mae frowned at the weird ideas her brain came up with when she didn’t have friends to hang out with. This was why waking up early wasn’t worth it—all her friends were busy working.

Well, actually, Lori probably wasn’t working—Lori was probably in school. But school was basically just work that you didn’t get paid for, so it was the same thing.

“One day I’ll have a job,” Mae muttered. “And my friends will want to hang out when I’m working. I’ll totally ditch work to hang out with them. That’s what friends do.”

“Who’re you talking to?” Gregg asked from behind the counter.

At the sound of Gregg’s voice, Mae’s heart nearly leaped out of her chest. She hadn’t seen Gregg come in—hadn’t even heard him. But he was just standing at the counter, staring over at her in mild confusion.

Mae made a mental note to get revenge on Gregg for nearly scaring her half to death.

“Where the hell did you come from?” Mae asked as she approached the counter. “Germ said you were eating lunch.”

“Yeah, I was eating a sandwich in the back. I don’t go out to eat, usually—just fix a sandwich at home and eat it here.” Gregg pointed over his shoulder at the wall behind him, apparently trying to communicate some kind of location.

“This place has a back?!” Mae exclaimed.

“Yeah, it’s where the guys bring the chips!” Gregg said enthusiastically. He loved it when the guys brought the chips. “I gotta get here early and, like, sign for shit. Lemme tell ya, Mae, having a job is a real hassle sometimes.”

Mae laughed bitterly. “Tell me about it! When I had that one job, I actually cried when I realized I had to start going into work.”

The friendly, excited smile on Gregg’s face disappeared. He studied Mae, trying to decide if she was joking or not and quickly realized she wasn’t.

“Mae, that’s not normal,” Gregg said. “That’s… I think that’s something you should talk to someone about.”

Mae, who had assumed crying about working was a normal thing, felt her smile fall away. Now that Mae thought about it, Gregg was probably right. That whole ‘breaking down and crying thing’ was definitely something Mae should have been more concerned about.

It was beginning to feel like every time Mae opened up to her friends about something, she found something new to bring up with her therapist. If she ever got a therapist, that was.

Mae was still getting around to that.

“You know what?” Mae asked, a realization dawning. “I’m tired of thinking about jobs. I’ve been thinking about that junk all day. I just wanna do something I actually enjoy before I give up a chunk of my life to some faceless corporation.”

Gregg nodded. A look of displeasure appeared on his face as some disconcerting thought seemed to occur to him.

“Dude, could you imagine if corporations actually had faces?” Gregg asked in a horrified whisper.

Mae immediately pictured a giant, scowling face coming out of the exterior of the Ham Panther outside of town. Any resolve or enthusiasm Mae had for the rest of the day faded away in an instant. For the next few hours, all Mae would be able to think about was the Ham Panther Face.

“Damn, dude,” Mae muttered. “Damn.”


	5. The Glass Factory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve Scriggins works his side-job. Mae hangs out with hooligans.

Nobody went to the old glass factory anymore. Nobody had any reason to. After the place shut down years ago, it had been left to rot by its owners. Now the factory was a big, dead thing on the outskirts of Possum Springs, visible from almost anywhere in the town. It was like the beached carcass of a whale—it sat around, flaunting its deadness for all to see.

Pretty much everyone steered clear of the factory. Mostly because of, you know, all of the broken glass. It certainly hadn’t helped that someone had broken in all of the windows. You couldn’t take two steps without stepping on glass.

Luckily, Steve Scriggins had some really thick boots.

Steve, Beth, and Levy were pretty much the only people who came to the glass factory. There was plenty of stuff in the old building that they could scavenge for some quick cash. The walls in particular still had plenty of copper pipes and wiring left in them. The copper wasn’t worth a lot, but it provided a nice bonus on top of the money Steve made working on his bro’s construction crew.

The factory wasn’t the only place in town to get copper, either. Possum Springs was basically falling apart, and most of the older buildings had been abandoned. Every day after work, Steve would head out, alone or with friends, and get to work tearing copper out of the walls of some building or another.

Steve affectionately referred to these blatant crimes as his ‘side-job’.

A day or two after the disastrous party that had been held for Daryl Peach, Steve packed up his tools and drove out to the glass factory to do some scavenging. He hadn’t told Beth and Levy to meet him at the factory, but he wasn’t surprised to see Levy’s old sedan sitting in the factory’s parking lot. Steve parked his car, grabbed his bag of tools, and turned up the music playing from his phone’s connected earbuds.

The inside of the glass factory was creepy. If Steve were the philosophizing sort, he would have described it as a haunting reminder of time and nature’s inevitable victory over all of mankind’s various accomplishments. Steve wasn’t the philosophizing sort, though, so he just thought that the factory was really, really dirty.

Steve found Beth and Levy both hanging out on the main factory floor. Neither of them looked up to greet Steve when he came in. Beth was focused on her phone, evidently somehow getting wi-fi all the way out here. Levy was sitting with his back to one of the old machines, chucking rocks at the wall opposite him. His eyes were baggy and bloodshot.

Levy had been a burnout before he even got into high school. Rather than spending his school years studying or socializing, Levy had spent them getting high and selling weed. He used to get the stuff from his brother in Bright Harbor, but now Levy had a setup in his basement where he could grow it by himself. He’d made some attempts to move onto selling more serious stuff, but those had all led to nothing but trouble, especially lately.

Beth Holstead, easily the trashiest member of the group, was only slightly less of a burnout than Levy. Sure, she did drugs in weird places, but she at least had an actual job, unlike Levy. And sure, she sniffed glue and slept around a lot, but those weren’t exactly bad things. Out of all three of them, Steve felt like Beth was probably the least likely to wind up in jail.

Steve stood in the doorway, staring at Levy and Beth. Loud, screechy death metal blared from the earbuds Steve wore as he waited for either of them to notice him. By the time next track in his playlist started, though, Steve knew that wasn’t going to happen.

“’Sup, punks?” Steve asked as he tugged his earbuds out of his ears.

Beth and Levy both glanced at Steve briefly. Neither of them spoke—evidently, just turning their heads and looking at someone constituted a greeting. Steve had to guess that Beth and Levy were either tired, burned out, or both.

On the other side of the machine that Levy had his back to, there was a wall. A large hole had been broken in the wall’s plaster, exposing the pipes and wires that ran throughout the building. Similar, smaller holes were dotted all over the factory’s interior. Most of them were only big enough for a single piece of pipe to be visible, but they could always be made bigger.

Steve carried a heavy backpack on one shoulder as he approached the wall. Inside of the bag, there were hammers, a saw, pliers—all the tools Steve needed for his side-job. They all belonged to his brother, but Steve figured that he wouldn’t miss them. Besides, Steve was using this stuff to make money—his brother only used the tools to fix things around the house.

Steve dropped his bag down onto the dusty, glass-littered floor and looked into the hole in the wall. Immediately, he noticed something was off.

“Hey, Levy!” Steve hollered over his shoulder. “You been taking copper from here? You know I called dibs on this spot!”

The sound of rocks bouncing off of the factory’s walls momentarily stopped. Steve glanced back at Levy, who was gazing vaguely in Steve’s direction. He looked irritated, as if Steve was interrupting something very important for no real reason. He also looked sort of confused, but that was pretty typical for Levy.

“You don’t own this factory, Scriggins,” Levy said. His voice was soft and slow—old people and hippies might describe it as ‘mellow’. It was definitely a voice you’d associate with someone who did weed and took various downers. In Steve’s opinion, Levy’s voice was incredibly punchable.

“The hell I don’t!” Steve retorted. “I’m the only one using it for anything!”

Levy picked up one of the small rocks littering the ground and chucked it in Steve’s direction. The rock whizzed past Steve’s head and bounced off the wall, clattering back down to the floor. Steve quickly scooped it back up and threw it at Levy, striking the side of the burnout’s head.

“Ow!” Levy rubbed the side of his head, clearly caught off-guard. The patch of skin where the rock had struck already looked like it would leave a nasty bruise.

Steve pointed a finger at Levy and laughed mockingly. “Hweh heh heh!”

Levy glared angrily at Steve, apparently not appreciating the hilarity of getting hit by a rock. Some people just couldn’t take a joke. Or a rock to the head.

“So is this a thing now?” Beth asked, her eyes still on her phone. “You two just gonna throw rocks at each other like kids?”

Levy, who’d been reaching for a rock to throw at Steve, bashfully withdrew his hand at Beth’s accusation. Steve snorted in derision and leaned back against the wall behind him.

“Y’know, I went to that party you told me about the other night.” As he spoke, Steve fished around in his jacket’s pockets for his cigarettes. If he’d left them at home after getting off of work, he thought, he was going to snap. “It blew chunks.”

Steve’s fingers brushed against the familiar texture of his pack of smokes. While he got to work lighting one of the cigarettes up, Levy stared at him uncomprehendingly.

“What party?” Levy asked.

Steve had just finished lighting up when Levy asked his question. His eyes flicked up from the glowing end of his cigarette and scanned Levy’s face to see if he was joking. Steve quickly realized that, no, he wasn’t.

“What party?” He repeated incredulously. “God, Levy, it’s Possum Springs—how many parties are there, really? The one in the woods! The one you didn’t even show up for!”

Levy frowned. “Oh, okay. I don’t remember that one.”

“Stunning,” Beth grumbled, her eyes still focused on her phone.

Levy looked back and forth between Steve and Beth obliviously. The fact that he was this much of a space case without taking any really serious drugs was astounding. The fact that his spaciness hadn’t gotten him busted for possession was even more amazing. Then again, this was Possum Springs—as far as Steve knew, the town only had two cops.

“Whatever. Probably good you didn’t show up anyway,” Steve said. “I’m pretty sure I saw Dudley hanging out at the party.”

“Oh.” That was all Levy said. From the looks of things, it was the only thing he could say. A very worried expression had appeared on his face. Levy looked away from Steve and began staring at the wall in front of him.

Steve couldn’t really blame him for being nervous. Levy was in serious trouble with Dudley, and Dudley evidently wasn’t the kind of guy you effed around with. It was his own damn fault, though, so Steve wasn’t too concerned.

Steve sighed and turned to look at his own wall. Through the hole in its surface, he could see that Levy hadn’t taken that much of the piping. Most of the wires were untouched, as well. Still, Steve was pretty angry that Levy had taken from a spot that Steve had called dibs on. It was the principle of the thing that bothered Steve, really.

Steve kneeled down in front of the hole and began to get to work. There were pipes to pull out, and wires to strip and sort. Over the last couple of years, Steve had kind of gotten to be an old pro at this. Pipes, wires, doorknobs—Steve had learned how to handle them all, and how to identify what would sell best.

Sure, what Steve was doing wasn’t exactly legal. But so what? No one was using any of this shit. And stealing copper wasn’t anywhere near as bad as the stuff some people did for money.

Time passed, and Steve worked in silence. He figured that pretty soon, he’d need to make this hole bigger—either that, or start working on a new spot. There were always the factory machines to look at, too—there was bound to be something there that Steve could yank off and sell.

A familiar voice broke the silence before Steve could really start thinking about any of that, though. It was a voice Steve hadn’t been expecting to hear in the factory. It was a voice Steve never wanted to hear around him, period.

“What are you guys doing in here?” Mae Borowski asked from somewhere far behind Steve.

Steve let loose a long, annoyed sigh.

* * *

 

  
Nobody went to the old glass factory anymore. At least, that’s what Mae thought. She imagined homeless people might drop by it for shelter, but she’d never really thought that people hung out in the factory. There was probably broken glass and shit all over the place. It was probably the sort of place where you’d get cut on something and catch a terrible disease.

So, in summary, it was exactly the type of abandoned building that Mae would go to.

Mae wasn’t sure herself why she decided to go to the factory that day. She’d woken up a little early (She’d been doing that a lot lately) and had just started walking. Before Mae knew it, she had hiked all the way out to the Big Skeleton on the edge of town.

The inside of the glass factory was creepy. It wasn’t scary-creepy, like an old house, though; it was more of a sad-creepy, like a graveyard. It was a big, broken-down dead thing. The only reason it was still around was because nobody cared enough to knock it down. Instead, they just left it behind to die and rot away.

Also, the whole place smelled like pee and nature.

It didn’t take Mae very long to find out the place wasn’t as abandoned as she’d thought, though. As she moved further into the factory, the smell of cigarette smoke became more and more noticeable. At first, Mae thought that someone had come to smoke here in the last few days. But once her allergies started to act up, Mae realized that someone was actually currently smoking.

Mae walked deeper into the factory, making her way to the main floor’s entrance. The doors that had been in the doorframe looked like they’d been removed—either that, or the factory just never had doors here. That didn’t make sense, though. Mae wasn’t sure why she’d thought that.

The source of the cigarette smoke became clear to Mae fairly quickly. Three people were gathered by one of the machines, and Mae instantly recognized Steve Scriggins among their number. He was crouching down in front of a hole in the wall, a bag of tools at his side. For some reason, there was a pile of stuff next to him—it looked like metal, but Mae wasn’t sure. Was Steve a repairman or something?

Wait. No. Why would a repairman come to an abandoned building?

It only took Mae a couple of seconds to recognize the other two. The one sitting against the machine and staring at the wall was Levy. Levy had been a sketchy guy, even back in high school. According to Gregg and Angus, Levy had hung out in one of the boy’s bathrooms, selling weed to other students.

The third person was Beth Holstead, who Mae only really knew through other people. Casey and her had hung out a little in high school. There’d been a lot of rumors about Beth back then. There’d been a lot of rumors about Casey, too. Mae hadn’t put much stock into those stories.

Mae didn’t really want to talk to these people. Steve was bad enough, but Steve in addition to his friends? That was too much jerkiness to take in in one sitting. But it wasn’t like Mae had anything better to do. She wouldn’t be able to hang out with Bea or Gregg for another couple of hours.

“Hey,” Mae called out. “What are you guys doing in here?”

Levy and Beth both turned to look at Mae. Neither of them seemed surprised to see her—they both seemed kinda bored, actually. But while Beth’s expression remained mostly neutral, Levy began glaring at Mae once he realized who she was. Mae was kind of used to that.

Steve was still facing the wall, but he’d stopped working on whatever he’d been doing. When he turned around to face Mae, he didn’t have his usual shit-eating grin. He looked pretty annoyed, but Mae wasn’t sure why. Had she interrupted his important business with the hole in the wall? Oh, how unfortunate!

“Working,” Steve said dismissively. “What’re you doing in here?”

Mae frowned. “You’re just standing in front of a hole. Levy and Beth aren’t even doing anything.”

“Yeah, no,” Beth said, returning her gaze to her phone. “I’m just hanging out. How you doing, Borowski?”

Mae raised a hand and waved briefly at Beth. “Well, I can’t find a job and my best friend’s moving soon, but other than that, I’m fine.”

“Cool,” Beth said absently. “I’m working for Mr. Salvi’s landscaping. Getting all gross and sweaty.”

“You’re always gross and sweaty,” Steve mocked.

Beth, eyes still on her phone, lifted up a feathery hand and showed Steve her middle finger. Steve waved a hand dismissively at the gesture, but smiled just a bit.

“No, but seriously, what’re you doing in the glass factory?” Mae asked. “Do you, like… need glass? Do the machines here still run?”

Steve stared at Mae like she was the stupidest person on the planet. Mae had no clue why, though; it was a legitimate question, right? She had no idea how you made glass. For all Mae knew, it was perfectly possible to plug the factory’s machines in and start pumping out glass.

“We’re not here for glass, genius,” Steve said, irritation in his voice. “Me and Levy come here for our side-job sometimes.”

“Side-job?” Mae asked. She hadn’t even been aware that Steve had a regular job. It was kind of hard to picture Steve doing something for a living. Had he gotten some job that involved pointing and laughing at people? Had he become a garbage-man?

Wait. No. Steve had always been a garbage-man. Zing! Burn!

Steve, oblivious to the sick burn Mae had just made in her mind, gestured to the assortment of metal that Mae had noticed earlier. It mostly looked like pipes and wires—probably pulled out from the walls of the factory, Mae realized. But why would Steve and Levy just bust into some place and yank useless crap out of the walls?

“I don’t follow,” Mae said.

Steve gave a small snort of derision. “That ain’t a surprise.”

Mae frowned. Here she was, asking perfectly innocent questions, and she was getting treated like a moron for it. Then again, Steve probably treated everyone like a moron. He’d been a huge asshole back in high school, and it didn’t look like that had changed at all.

Mae turned her head in Levy’s direction. “Wanna fill me in?”

Levy’s glare only intensified when Mae asked her question. “What, you think I’m dumb enough to tell you anything? I still remember that shit that happened in 10th grade, man. I was in deep shit after you ratted me out to your aunt.”

“Whoa, what?” Mae’s eyes widened in surprise. She didn’t remember what Levy was talking about, but she knew he must have been mistaken. For one thing, Mae wasn’t a snitch. Even if Mae was a snitch, there’s no way she’d rat someone out to Aunt Mall Cop. Not unless they were, like, a gross murderer, or something.

“Look, dude,” Mae said, “I dunno what you think I did, but I never ratted anyone out to my aunt. If my aunt busted you for something, someone else tipped her off.”

Levy scoffed. “Okay. Sure. Guess you must have an identical twin or something, huh?”

Mae threw her hands in the air in frustration. “I don’t even know what you’re talking about, dude! We didn’t even hang out in high school! Did we even have any classes together? I’m pretty sure I only ever saw you when you were creeping outside the school!”

Mae stood there, hands raised up, waiting for Levy to explain himself. Instead of giving any kind of clarification, though, Levy just turned and resumed staring at the wall in front of him.

“Hey,” Steve chimed in impatiently. He’d stepped away from the wall and was beginning to approach Mae. For a moment, Mae thought that he was going to try and throw her out of his weird factory clubhouse. Steve stopped a few feet away, however, and spat his cigarette down onto the floor.

“You didn’t answer my question at the party,” Scriggins said as he stamped the cigarette out, black ash scattering under his boot. “Do you know if Hartley left any stuff behind before he left? Don’t lie, neither—this is important.”

Mae wasn’t surprised by the question this time. Honestly, she’d pretty much expected Steve to ask it again. This time, though, there was no convenient trombone to stop Mae from answering. Mae had to stop herself from immediately mentioning the lockbox from Casey’s note like some sort of idiot.

“What… kinda stuff?” Mae asked vaguely.

“It’s a yes-or-no question,” Steve said dryly. “If you don’t know what I’m talking about, then forget it. I just thought Casey mighta told you or Gregg something before he left town.”

Mae frowned. She still didn’t know why Steve was asking about all of this, and she was feeling too impatient to let it slide. Maybe it was because she knew what Steve didn’t—Casey hadn’t left town. He’d never leave town. He was dead. And Steve had no right to be demanding something Casey had left behind without even knowing that.

“It’s none of your business if he did tell us something!” Mae snapped. “Why do you care about Casey’s stuff? You were such an asshole to Casey in high school! Or what, did that change when I was gone? Did you two suddenly become best friends? Did Casey suddenly start hanging out with assholes and criminals?”

For a moment, it looked like Steve didn’t know what to make of Mae’s questions. He had one eyebrow raised in confused surprise. His expression made it seem as if Mae had somehow insulted him. Mae expected Steve was going to start screaming and cussing her out. If that happened, Mae was prepared to bring out her earlier garbage-man joke.

Instead, he was surprisingly quiet when he spoke.

“God, you’re such an idiot,” he said, practically snarling.

“What?!” Mae was suddenly aware that all eyes were on here. She looked away from Steve and saw that both Levy and Beth were glaring at her. Well, Levy was glaring—Beth just looked kind of uncomfortable with the whole situation.

“Get outta here, Borowski,” Levy demanded, slowly rising up to his feet. “Or else.”

Despite the animosity in Levy’s voice, Mae couldn’t help but laugh. Even if Levy was a literal drug dealer, he was also one of the scrawniest people Mae knew. He was about as threatening as Mae’s elderly neighbor, Mr. Penderson.

From the look on his face, though, Levy was seriously angry. Normally, he just looked kind of wasted. Mae didn’t know what she’d done to deserve this kind of attention. All she’d done was call Steve out on his behavior, but now suddenly she was the asshole here? Had these people never actually met Steve?

“Fine, whatever,” Mae said, folding her arms over her chest. “You guys can go back to knocking holes in walls or whatever. I’ll leave.”

“Good,” Steve said as Mae turned and began walking away.

Mae didn’t pay him any attention. She kept on walking out of the factory floor and down the glass factory’s hallways. As she stepped out into the factory’s parking lots, the cold February afternoon still going strong, Mae couldn’t help but wonder why she’d even come up here.

Interacting with Steve was a headache. Interacting with Steve and Levy was an even bigger headache. Beth was okay, but the other two were just huge assholes. And now Mae had even more questions than she’d had before.

Did any of this really matter, though? Mae doubted it somehow. It sort of seemed like Steve wasn’t asking about the lockbox. After all, Steve wasn’t exactly subtle—if he wanted to know about the money, he would’ve straight up mentioned it. But what, then, was Steve asking about? And why did it involve Casey?

And more importantly, why was it so important to Steve anyway?


	6. The Stranger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mae and Bea catch up with someone from school. A strange man has some questions for Mae.

The Ol’ Pickaxe was not a big store. It didn’t have long aisles composed of nothing but nails, or big displays informing customers about the new types of hammers they could buy. The Pickaxe didn’t need that stuff. The shop was able to hang everything it sold right up on its walls, or on a few shelves and tables along the sides. If there wasn’t room for something, it was stored in the back until it was bought or until room was made.

Mae stood in front of the wall opposite the shop’s counter, staring carefully at the selection on display. This wall served as the gardening section for the Ol’ Pickaxe. Dozens of pieces of hardware hung in front of her, half of them nearly indistinguishable from each other. Mae found herself nearly dumbfounded by the sheer number of shovels in particular. There were farming shovels; round point shovels; square point shovels; trenching shovels; transfer shovels; utility shovels…

And that wasn’t even getting into the spades.

Why were there so many types of shovel? Who would need all of these shovels? Didn’t they all do basically the same thing?

Mae had been asking herself these questions for about ten minutes. That was how long she’d been staring at the wall for. Mae was beginning to think she had a tendency to fixate on things.

It wasn’t like Mae could afford one of these, anyway. She was still broke as heck. No, at the moment, Mae was just browsing; trying to figure out which one of these shovels was the right shovel. When Mae went out looking for Casey’s legendary lockbox, only the finest shovel would do. She couldn’t dig up the last thing Casey had left behind with some peasant’s shovel.

Not that Mae would know a peasant shovel if she saw one. They all looked pretty much the same. She wouldn’t be able to pick one out without an expert’s opinion.

Mae craned her head a bit and yelled over her shoulder. “Hey, Bea?”

“Yeah?” Bea’s voice came from the other end of the store, at the Pickaxe’s front counter. Despite how important Mae’s shovel business was, Bea sounded kind of disinterested.

“Which one of these shovels is the best for digging up treasure?” Mae asked.

Bea gave no answer. After a few seconds of silence, Mae called out again.

“Bea? You there?”

“Yeah, sorry,” Bea said. “I just… needed to take that question in. Have you tried a digging shovel?”

“Aren’t all shovels digging shovels?” Mae returned her attention to the shovels hanging on the wall. Sure enough, there was a type of shovel that was for some reason specifically referred to as a ‘digging shovel’.

The cheapest one was around fourteen dollars. For someone like Mae, that number might as well have been a thousand. Mae stared at the shovel, desperately longing for what could never be. The holes that would never be dug and the zombies who would never get their heads bashed in.

“Is it possible I could just borrow one of these?” Mae asked. “I’d bring it back. You could just clean it up and hang it back on the wall.”

“Mae, I’m with a customer!” Bea snapped. “… And also, no, you absolutely can’t just borrow one.”

Mae turned around, surprised. She hadn’t realized there was another person in the Pickaxe besides Bea and herself. When she turned towards the front counter, she saw there were actually two other people in the shop. One of them was the customer Bea was apparently dealing with. It took Mae a few seconds to recognize that the customer was Erika Larsen, Daryl’s cousin.

The other person was in a stroller being pushed around by Erika. It didn’t take Mae even half a second to recognize that it was a baby. Only babies hung out in strollers and wore onesies with ‘I’M GRAMMA’S GIRL’ on them.

Stupid babies and their terrible fashion sense. Mae was proud of the fact that she had better taste than a baby.

Erika, seemingly just noticing Mae was there, smiled and waved. Mae was a little surprised by the lack of hostility from someone she’d gone to high school with. Then again, Mae supposed she hadn’t really known Erika well enough to do anything to piss her off. Mae couldn’t really say that about most of her old classmates.

“Hey there!” Erika said as Mae approached the front counter. “Mae Borowski, right? The one who nearly burned down the school?”

It was somewhat refreshing to Mae to hear herself referred to as ‘the person who nearly burned down the school’ instead of ‘the person who messed up that one kid’s face forever’. For one thing, almost burning down the school was something Mae was proud of. For another, nearly burning down the school hadn’t caused several people to hate her forever.

“Yeah,” Mae said. “I mean, I wasn’t alone. Gregg helped. The sprinklers saved all the teachers’ jobs, though.”

Erika laughed at that. Mae had a feeling she wouldn’t have been laughing if Gregg and Mae actually had burned the school down. It was really kind of interesting how the absence or presence of a huge fire could completely change someone’s outlook on something.

“Mae doesn’t set nearly as many things on fire these days,” Bea said as she leaned on the countertop. “As far as I know, at least.”

Erika and Bea both shared a chuckle. Mae, who felt like it had indeed been a criminally long time since she’d started a fire, was too distracted to join in. She felt on edge, as if she were being watched. Mae could practically feel someone’s eyes on her. And since there were only three other people in the Pickaxe at the moment, it didn’t take Mae long to deduce that the baby in Erika’s stroller was staring at her.

Mae looked down at the little baby in the pink onesie. The baby was staring up at her with big, dumb, uncomprehending eyes. It made Mae feel a little uncomfortable. Of course, babies made Mae uncomfortable in general. They were basically just tiny, person-shaped poop factories that slowly turned into actual people.

“Hey, Erika?” Mae said, not looking up from the baby. “Is this… yours?”

“Yeah, this is Georgie,” Erika said, laughing as she looked down at the baby. “She’s only six months old, but my parents have already spoiled her rotten.”

The baby, who looked to Mae like it wouldn’t even be able to recognize its grandparents if they weren’t right in front of it, gurgled incomprehensively. Bubbles of drool rose to the baby’s mouth. Erika cooed at her baby’s noises, apparently proud of the six-month-old’s attempt at nonverbal communication. Mae wasn’t anywhere near as impressed.

Mae watched as Erika knelt down and began wiping the drool off of Georgie’s face with a tissue. Mae couldn’t help but be weirded out by the sight of someone her own age happily wiping up their baby’s drool. Oh, sure, Mae had known a few people in high school who’d gotten pregnant—but that was teenage pregnancy. Erika was, as far as Mae knew, an adult.

Mae didn’t always have good words for how stuff made her feel. All Mae knew was that seeing an old classmate acting like a parent made Mae feel like a little kid in comparison.

“Why’ve you got a baby in a tool store?” Mae asked, finally managing to tear her eyes away from Georgie’s terrible stare.

Erika tucked the tissue she’d used on Georgie’s face away into a side-pocket on the stroller. She stood back up beside her stroller, and for a moment Mae saw something in Erika’s face that she couldn’t quite describe. It was an expression that had a sadness that Mae didn’t understand. It was an expression that looked far too old for the person who was making it.

The expression was gone in an instant, though, and soon Erika had the same tired smile that she’d had before. Mae almost believed she’d just imagined the sad, old look on Erika’s face.

“We’re meeting my folks at the Clik Clak,” Erika explained. “Just dropped by to say hi to Bea.”

“You’re bringing your baby to a restaurant?” Mae asked in disbelief. “Why? They don’t even have baby food there, and she’s just gonna make a lotta noise.”

“Mae!” Bea whispered, trying to chastise Mae quietly.

Erika attempted to politely laugh Mae’s comment off. “I mean, she’s usually good when she’s out of the house. She ain’t too fussy so long as she’s had a nap.”

That, finally, was something Mae could understand. She was pretty fussy if she didn’t get enough sleep, either. Mae felt as if the generation gap had finally been bridged, and that she could understand babies a little better now.

She still didn’t like babies, of course, but who did? They were awful little gremlins you had to be super delicate with.

Erika, who would probably never refer to her daughter as a gremlin out loud, spoke up. “So what’re you doing in here, Mae? You planning on doing some gardening?”

Mae frowned, puzzled. It took her a moment to remember that she’d just been staring at the Pickaxe’s gardening selection like a weirdo. It wasn’t a surprise someone would see Mae and think she had an interest in flowers and gnomes, or whatever people did with gardens.

“Oh, no,” Mae said. “I’m just looking for a shovel so I can dig up an old lockbox my friend Casey buried.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Mae could see Bea quietly placing her hands on her face. Although Bea made no noise, Mae had a feeling that she was groaning internally.

Mae returned her focus to Erika, who was staring at Mae in silence. Mae, who’d only now realized that what she’d said was kind of weird, couldn’t blame her. Sometimes Mae wished she could carry a little mirror around so she could stare at herself whenever she said something weird—then she’d know what it was like.

After a moment, Erika smiled and nodded politely. She looked like she was trying to figure out if Mae was joking or not, and was quickly discovering, much to her horror, that she wasn’t.

Erika stepped back behind her baby stroller, putting her hands on the handlebar. Mae almost thought that she’d actually scared Erika off, and the former cheerleader was going to fun away, fearing for her baby’s life. While that would’ve been funny to watch, it also would’ve been a little rude.

“Well, have fun digging up whatever Casey buried! I bet there’s a whole bunch of stuff that guy left behind.”

Mae blinked in surprise. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Well, I gotta get going!” Erika said hurriedly. “It was nice seeing both of you!”

Erika walked backwards, wheeling her stroller along with her as she pushed the Pickaxe’s door open with her butt. By the time the bell over the door rang with its closing, Mae realized that Erika had completely ignored her question.

“Huh,” Mae said contemplatively. She turned towards Bea, who was now sitting up straight behind the cash register. “So Erika’s a mom now, huh?”

“Yup,” Bea said, clearly too tired to be sarcastic. “Her and a couple of other people from school, actually. Not like there’s anything to do around here except work and get pregnant.”

Mae laughed at that. “Yeah,” she said. “Ever since the town’s thriving cult community died out, the gamut of stuff to do’s really run out.”

Bea blinked, surprised. “Did you just say ‘gamut’?”

“What?” Mae asked. “I’ve been reading more.”

Bea looked up at the clock above the Pickaxe’s door. Mae followed her gaze and saw that it was starting to get close to closing time. Mae turned back towards Bea, who was already getting her pack of cigarettes out from beneath the counter.

“You wanna do anything tonight?” Mae asked.

“Can’t,” Bea said as she placed a cigarette between her lips. From the looks of things, it was another one of the dummies that she just chewed on. “I gotta do business stuff with the Chamber of Commerce. Assuming they don’t bail out again…”

Mae groaned inwardly. She passed those Chamber of Commerce people in the streets every so often, and they were always so boring. They were always arguing with each other, or… well, mostly, they just argued with each other. And, yeah, it was funny hearing old people insult each other, but you could only take so much of it in one sitting.

“I guess I’ll see what Gregg’s up to,” Mae mused. “Try and get some hang-time in before spring.”

Bea sat up, a thought occurring to her. “Hey, speaking of Gregg moving, how are you dealing with that whole… situation?”

“Good!” Mae said. “Surprisingly good!” And she meant it. Mae was honestly a little astounded by how well she was handling her best friend’s upcoming move to Bright Harbor. Mae didn’t know if that was because she was becoming more mature, or if the reality of the situation just hadn’t settled in yet. In all likelihood, Mae felt like she’d start feeling progressively worse once the date of the move came closer.

“That’s good, I guess,” Bea said. “Hey, you know, if you ever wanna talk about the Bright Harbor thing, I—”

“I know,” Mae said quickly. She appreciated the offer, but she didn’t want to talk about the Bright Harbor thing yet. The longer she could go without thinking about it, the better she’d feel.

Bea frowned, clearly not satisfied with Mae’s dismissive answer. “Okay, well… Take care, then.”

Mae nodded, but didn’t say anything as she hurried out of the Pickaxe. There would be time later to talk with Bea about their friends moving away. There wasn’t any reason to talk about it now, when Mae wasn’t even feeling bad about it. It wouldn’t do Mae any good to start missing Gregg before he even moved away.

Standing outside of the Pickaxe’s front door, Mae looked down the street towards Towne Centre. The sky was cloudy, only thin beams of sunlight managing to break through. Mae breathed in the cool February air, savoring it while she could. It wouldn’t be long until things started getting a lot warmer. The days would be longer, too—no more early evening walks through town.

The warm seasons always seemed to drag on forever, but they also seemed to take their time showing up.

Mae began walking in the direction of the Snack Falcon. The early evening pedestrian traffic in Possum Springs was, as always, very light; mostly people going to jobs, going home, or going to eat. There were a dozen or so people in all, going about their business and never paying very much mind to each other.

That was why it was such a surprise to Mae when someone called out to her.

“Hey, kid!”

Mae stopped turned back towards the Pickaxe, where the voice had come from. An older man in a flannel jacket was approaching her very quickly. For a moment, Mae thought she was going to be attacked—the guy had a very intense, angry expression on his face. As he got closer, though, Mae realized that he wasn’t angry at her. Rather, he was just sort of angry in general.

“I’m an adult,” Mae corrected as the man came within speaking range. “I’m a legal adult.”

“Yeah, sure,” the man said gruffly, stopping just in front of her. He looked down at Mae, an eyebrow raised. “What the hell are you staring at?”

Mae, who hadn’t even realized she’d been staring, quickly drew her gaze away from the stranger’s face. “You’ve got a tattoo,” Mae pointed out dumbly, gesturing to the left side of his face. A black, intricate tribal tattoo went over his eye and temple and traveled down to his cheek.

The man’s eyes glanced down and to the left, as if for a moment he was trying to see the tattoo for himself. His gaze flickered back towards Mae in an instant as he regarded her with a scowl.

“… Do I know you?” Mae asked, confused. The man looked vaguely familiar, but Mae couldn’t assign a name to his tattooed face.

“No,” the man said, folding his arms over his chest. “I know you, though.”

“Okay. That’s not creepy at all.” Mae was suddenly very glad that she was talking to this man out in the open, with plenty of people around.

“You’re May Barkovski,” the man said.

“I mean, that’s, like… partially right.”

The man nodded as he looked Mae over, seemingly studying her. He looked like he was trying to determine if he could beat her in a fight. Mae knew this because she also frequently tried to guess how easily she could beat random strangers up. Unlike Mae, though, this guy looked as if he’d actually follow through on that chain of thought.

“Now, see, I saw you at that party in the woods,” the man said, whispering conspiratorially. “And I heard that Scriggins kid ask yous about Hartley. And just now, I heard you mention Hartley in there with your gal-pals.”

Mae was almost so distracted by her hatred for the word ‘gal-pal’ that she almost missed out on what this man had said. But the mention of Casey, as well as the fact that this guy had just admitted to eavesdropping on her, was enough to warrant Mae’s attention. Even Mae, who didn’t understand why people might yank valuable metal out of the walls of a building, understood that this guy was getting more and more shady.

“Have you…” Mae paused. Her voice was shaking a little. She cleared her throat and spoke again, trying to sound less creeped out. “Have you been following me?”

The man’s scowl, seemingly always present on his tattooed face, grew even angrier. “I been following lots of people—you ain’t special, kid. Hell, you ain’t even on my shit list yet. I just got a question for you.”

Mae could guess what the tattoo man was going to ask about. Over the last few days, Mae had been asked about one subject in particular at least twice. The rule of three, a common literary device in some of Mae’s favorite stories, was about to come into effect.

“Do you know where Hartley is?” The tattoo man asked. His gravelly tone sounded almost accusatory, as if Mae were being interrogated. “See, I dunno if I buy that he left town. I dunno if Hartley was that smart. So if you know where he is, you’d better tell me before you tell Scriggins or Levy, got it?”

Mae wasn’t quite sure what to say. She’d been intimated by the tattoo man before—now, though, she was just annoyed. For one thing, Mae was getting pretty sick of people asking her if she knew what had happened to Casey. She did know what had happened to him. She was one of the only few people who knew. But if Mae couldn’t tell Casey’s own stepdad the truth, she definitely couldn’t tell the truth to some random asshole in flannel.

To top it all off, the tattoo man seemed to be under the impression that Mae would willingly tell Steve Scriggins or Levy anything remotely useful. That was just insulting.

“Why the hell do you want to know where Casey is?!” Mae snapped. “Why the hell do assholes keep asking me about Casey?! I got news for ya, citizen: It’s none of your business! Just forget about it! He’s got nothing to do with you!”

Tattoo man regarded Mae with surprise, clearly taken aback by her outburst. Most people had enough common sense not to shout at a guy who looked like the tattoo man did. Mae’s stupidity had caught him entirely off-guard.

The tattoo man mulled things over for a moment. He looked like he was deciding whether or not he could get away with cold-clocking Mae right then and there. After a moment of silence, the tattoo man spoke, his tongue in his cheek as he did so.

“Huh.”

Mae blinked in surprise. “’Huh?’”

The tattoo man nodded, once again sizing Mae up. This time, though, it looked as if he was trying to get a second impression of her.

“You really don’t know anything about Hartley, huh?” The tattoo man asked.

Mae felt her irritation leave her suddenly and swiftly. The sincerity in the tattoo man’s voice—as if he was apologizing for making a false assumption—only increased his question’s impact. Mae didn’t know what to say to that. What could she say? What did the tattoo man even mean?

Before Mae could ask for clarification, though, a voice cut into the conversation.

“What’s going on here?”

The tattoo man once again had an angry expression on his face. Mae could hazard a guess why—the person who’d just spoken tended to make Mae angry, too. Mae turned around to face her least-favorite relative, who was standing beside her patrol car.

“Hi, Aunt Molly,” Mae groaned.

Molly didn’t respond. She wasn’t even looking at Mae—Molly’s eyes were locked on the tattoo man, who had started walking in the opposite direction. Molly didn’t pursue him, but she looked like she was making damn sure that he was gone. When he was finally a good distance away, Molly’s eyes flickered down to look at Mae.

“Get in the car, Mae,” Molly ordered.

There was something in Aunt Molly’s tone that Mae didn’t like. She was talking to Mae like she’d done something wrong. Sure, Mae had just finished shouting at a man in the middle of the street, but that didn’t really warrant Molly’s accusatory tone. Then again, Aunt Molly kind of always sounded like that to some degree.

“Am I under arrest or something?” Mae asked indignantly.

Aunt Molly folded her arms over her chest and narrowed her eyes at Mae. “That depends on what you were talking to Dudley Hughes about.”

Mae groaned. There was no point arguing with Aunt Molly when she was like this. And unlike other cops, Mae couldn’t just run from Molly. Molly could just pull up to Mae’s house for dinner and tell her parents all about how Mae was hanging with tattoo people.

Well, Mae guessed that cops other than Molly could do that if they wanted. It’d be weird, though.

* * *

 

  
Mae, despite never having been arrested, was very familiar with the inside of her aunt’s patrol car. Over the years, Aunt Molly had given Mae plenty of rides through Possum Springs. Most of the time, these were rides home after Mae had gone somewhere she shouldn’t have, like falling off of a telephone pole after sneaking through an abandoned playground.

Mae didn’t say anything after she got into the car. She definitely had questions, but she was too irritated to ask any of them. If Molly had been a little less abrasive when she told Mae to get into the car, Mae might have been more willing to talk.

Since that hadn’t happened, however, it was up to Aunt Molly to begin the conversation.

“Do you know who that man was?” Aunt Molly asked as she drove away from the Ol’ Pickaxe.

Mae had a few theories. The sketchiest man in town? The world’s biggest random asshole? A creep who was following her? Really, the possibilities were endless.

“No. I don’t.” Mae stared out the window as her aunt pulled the u-turn that would lead them to Mae’s house.

“Good,” Molly said. “Keep it that way. That’s not the sort of person you should be hanging around with.”

As much as Mae would have liked to get into an argument with her aunt, she couldn’t really disagree. Tattoo man had set off so many red flags that it wasn’t even funny. But he was also somehow tied in with Scriggins and Casey, so Mae was too busy being confused to really think about how dangerous he might have been. She’d have plenty of time to be afraid later.

“Why were you talking to him?” Molly asked. Some of the suspicion had dropped out of her voice. Not all of it, of course—Molly seemed like she was always suspicious of Mae for one reason or another.

“He’s the one who started talking to me,” Mae muttered irritably. “He said he’d been following me. Then he started asking questions about Casey.”

Molly’s patrol car pulled a U-turn at the end of Towne Centre, and soon began driving in the direction of Mae’s house. The only sound was the rumbling of the car’s engine and the wheels on the road. After a second of surprised silence, Molly finally spoke.

“He said he’d been following you?” Any suspicion in Molly’s voice had disappeared, giving way to genuine concern. When Mae looked away from the window and looked at her aunt, she saw that Molly looked both surprised and worried.

Mae felt some of the anger in her chest fade away. As much as Mae disliked Aunt Mall Cop, she couldn’t stay upset when Molly was clearly worried about her.

“Yeah,” Mae said. “He thought I knew where Casey Hartley was.”

Molly looked as if she wasn’t sure what to say. It occurred to Mae that she had never really talked to her family about Casey’s disappearance. As much as she was trying to open up to her parents, Mae didn’t think she could be honest on this particular subject. Not just because the truth was hard to believe, but…

Well, it hurt to think about it. It hurt to think that Casey had died alone and for nothing.

The people who had bene close to Casey didn’t need to know about that. As long as they thought Casey had just run away, they had hope. They could still picture a day when Casey might come home.

Mae didn’t want to take that away from anyone.

Molly drummed her fingers on the car’s steering wheel. She looked like she wanted to say something but couldn’t quite find the right words. As the patrol car slowly pulled up alongside Mae’s house, Molly finally seemed to figure out what she wanted to say. Molly parked the car and turned off the engine before turning to face Mae.

“Listen, Mae… I know this probably goes without saying, but be careful. Things have been strange in town lately. We’re still getting swamped with phone calls about those people that went missing last year.”

Ah, yes—the dead cultists. That was something else Mae would probably have to keep to herself forever. Mae tried her best to look disinterested, and not at all like someone who’d inadvertently killed a bunch of dudes.

“My point is, you need to start taking things more seriously,” Molly continued. “I mean, I get it—you’re young, you’re confident, you think you’re invincible. But you’re not. And one of these days, all that trouble you get into is going to catch up to you. Understand me?”

Mae had left the car before Molly even finished answering her question.


	7. The Favor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some people talk and then Mae checks her computer. The excitement never ends.

“I can’t believe you called me into town for this, Bea,” Jackie said.

“Yeah,” Bea sighed. “Yeah, I know. But she’s been weird, and I wanna cheer her up.”

Jackie didn’t bring up the fact that Mae was always weird. As much as Jackie didn’t like Mae, she wasn’t going to talk shit about her behind her back. That wasn’t the sort of person Jackie was. If she had a problem with someone (And she had a problem with lots of people) she’d tell them straight-up to their face, like she’d done to Mae several times before.

That’s why it was kind of a surprise that Jackie was now in Mae’s house.

Of course, Jackie hadn’t known she was going to be in Mae’s house. When Bea had called and asked Jackie for help, Jackie had assumed it was for something unrelated to Mae. Jackie usually assumed most things were unrelated to Mae, considering Mae didn’t seem to really get involved in anything. Bea calling Jackie for help cheering up Mae was pretty much the last thing Jackie had expected.

Mae’s house was surprisingly decent, though. Jackie had always kind of pictured Mae living somewhere with a lot more property damage. This was a pretty standard family home, though—Mae clearly hadn’t taken an axe to the walls or smashed the windows with a hammer.

Mae’s mom had been on her way out when Bea and Jackie had arrived. Mrs. Borowski seemed glad to see them, and was very polite when Jackie introduced herself. The stark contrast between Mae’s destructive attitude and her wholesome family life was kind of stunning.

“It’s, like, three in the afternoon,” Jackie said while she and Bea waited in the house’s living room. “Does she seriously sleep this late?”

Bea sighed. She chewed anxiously on the end of her dummy cigarette.

“Mae’s got a lot going on,” Bea explained. “I keep trying to get her to set up a regular sleep schedule, but it’s not really working.”

“Huh,” Jackie said, not really paying attention. Her focus was mainly on the picture of two cats in top-hats that hung above the couch. Who were these people? What was their story? For some reason, Jackie couldn’t help but be curious about these two dapper cats.

The noise of a pair of feet rapidly descending the stairs pulled Jackie’s attention away from the photo. Both Bea and Jackie turned towards the stairs just as Mae finished going down them. Mae turned and began walking into the living room where Bea and Jackie had gathered, her eyes focused downwards.

“Hey, mom? How long can I keep wearing the same pair of jeans before someone notices?”

Mae stopped at the living room’s entrance and stared at Bea and Jackie. She looked between the both of them, and then looked past them into the kitchen. Seeing that her mom wasn’t home, Mae returned her attention to the two girls who’d arrived, unannounced, in Mae’s living room.

“… Is this an intervention or something?” Mae asked.

* * *

Mae hadn’t left the house for two days.

This wasn’t just because of Mae’s usual laziness. No, Mae had become a shut-in for different reasons. The chief reason was the scary-looking tattooed guy who’d flat-out admitted he was following her. Aunt Mall Cop had promised that she and her partner would be on the lookout for him, but Mae didn’t have a lot of confidence in the Possum Springs police. That cult had operated in town for years and the cops had never found out about them, after all.

But Mae wasn’t just hiding.

Okay, she was mostly hiding, but she was also thinking. The last week or so had given Mae a lot to think about. Those thoughts had mostly been about Casey, and why Steve and tattoo man wanted to know about him. But thinking about Casey always made Mae feel sad, so she hadn’t really been able to work this stuff out.

The others had been worried. Gregg had even dropped by to check on Mae. After Mae explained that a sketchy tattoo man had been following her, though, Bea and the others seemed to understand why Mae was hesitant to go out for the time being.

That apparently meant it was perfectly okay to show up at Mae’s house unannounced, though.

It was a little surprising to see Bea waiting for Mae down in her living room. It was very surprising to see Jackie was also there. Mae supposed that her mom had let them in before going out to work. Hopefully, Jackie hadn’t tried to radicalize Mae’s mom or anything—Candy Borowski was way too nice to fight The Man.

“Sorry about the surprise,” Bea said, an unlit cigarette dangling between her lips. “You need to do something, though, Mae. You can’t spend your whole life in bed like you did at college.”

Mae’s eyes glanced at Jackie, worrying that she might misinterpret that statement as Mae just being lazy. Thankfully, Jackie was distracted by the photo of Mae’s great-granddad and his brother that hung up above the couch. She didn’t seem to have even registered what Bea had said. Mae couldn’t blame her; it was a pretty mesmerizing photo.

“I’ll get out eventually!” Mae assured. “I’ll go stir-crazy sooner or later, and then I’ll be back to jumping around town and walking on powerlines.”

“Oh, god, you still do that?” Jackie asked, her eyes still on the photo. “You know you’re gonna get yourself fried, right?”

“I have been told that, yes,” Mae said.

Mae watched as Jackie continued inspecting Mae’s home. Although she wasn’t talking, it was pretty clear that Jackie was wondering why she was there. Mae was wondering that, too. Bea, who was one of the most sensible people Mae knew, must have had a reason for brining Jackie into Mae’s house, right?

Bea evidently picked up on Mae’s confusion, and finally offered an explanation.

“So, you know how you kept bugging me about that one girl you met at that party Jackie threw?” Bea asked.

Mae frowned. Through most of December and January, Mae had asked Bea almost twice a week if Jackie had any parties coming up. The reason, obviously, was because Mae had really wanted to meet up with Bombshell. Mae supposed she’d come across as kind of desperate with how much she’d bothered Bea.

Mae guessed it was kind of weird—normal people probably didn’t get hung up on a stranger who’d flirted with them once at a party. But Bombshell had been almost exactly Mae’s type, and it wasn’t like Mae was really interested in anyone else.

Well, that wasn’t true. Mae had pretty much always had a crush on Gregg’s cousin, Jen. The problem with that, though, was that Jen pretty much looked exactly like Gregg. Hooking up with her would probably be kinda weird, considering Gregg was basically Mae’s brother.

“Basically, Bea wants me to help you get this girl’s info,” Jackie said as she sat down on the Borowski’s couch. “And, I mean, normally I’m busy with college shit, but Bea’s my girl, so I agreed.”

“Oh, wow,” Mae said gratefully. “Thanks, Jackie. I mean, I know you don’t really like me, but—”

“Yeah, no, let’s not get into that,” Jackie interrupted. “I didn’t come back to Possum Springs to start drama. If I wanted to stir shit up, I’d go show my dad my new piercing.”

Mae had no idea what that meant. She was a little afraid to ask, out of fear that Jackie might get offended and punch her lights out.

“So how’s this gonna work?” Mae asked. “Are you gonna talk to me over some sort of earpiece and tell me what to say to her?”

Jackie and Bea both stared at Mae in silence for a moment. Mae began to wish she had a dollar for every time someone reacted to her like this.

“No,” Jackie said patiently. “I’m going to ask her if she remembers you and then see if she wants your chat info. That’s it. I’m not going to hold your hand, Borowski—if you want dating advice, talk to Casey.”

Mae and Bea both exchanged a glance, the same thought occurring to them: she didn’t know. How could she? Jackie was off at college, throwing parties and changing the world. Jackie probably didn’t really bother trying to keep up with everything that went down in Possum Springs.

“Casey’s… not around anymore,” Bea said tactfully. “He hopped on a train sometime last year.”

Though her expression was unclear because of her glasses, Mae could tell that Jackie was surprised. It was about the same response Mae had had when she’d first been told the news about Casey. This was different, though—when Gregg told Mae that Casey had left town, he hadn’t known any better. If Jackie knew the truth, Mae thought, she’d be a lot more than just surprised.

“Well, that kinda sucks,” Jackie mused. “Casey always seemed pretty okay. He had that whole apathetic skaterboy thing going on—kinda hot, honestly.”

Mae laughed bitterly. If Casey had heard Jackie call him hot, he probably would have been extremely flattered. He’d always thought Jackie was the coolest. In fact, Mae was willing to bet that Casey had had something of a crush on her. Not that he ever acted on it—he’d either been too intimidated or too distracted to ever really talk to Jackie.

He’d never get a chance now, though.

Mae shook her head, trying to get her mind off of Casey. She’d been thinking about him too much lately. It was like life was constantly smashing reminders of Mae’s dead friend into her face. And for some reason, most of those reminders had come from shady criminals.

“So what should I say if she gets in touch?” Mae asked, trying to change the subject. “What should we talk about?”

“What did you two talk about at the party?” Bea asked.

Mae thought about it. A lot of that night was kind of hazy—she mostly remembered embarrassing Bea and then chasing her in the rain. A lot of the other stuff had just kind of been pushed into the background.

“I’m… not sure? I think I either told her about the ghost that had been following me, or I told her I was studying vampires in college.”

Jackie stared at Mae in disbelief. “Why… Why would you say that to someone?”

Mae shrugged. She talked about vampires a lot—they were one of the most interesting things to talk about. Whatever she’d said, though, it had led to a secret handshake and the Bombshell basically purring Mae’s name. Mae was more than willing to call that a success, given how garbage she could be at talking to people sometimes.

A thought occurred to Mae. She lifted her head and looked at both Jackie and Bea.

“Hey, why did you need to come into town to do this?” Mae asked Jackie. “Couldn’t you just, like, email her info to me? You wouldn’t have had to drive all the way out to Possum Springs.”

Jackie looked over at Bea expectantly. It started to dawn on Mae that Jackie wasn’t sure why she’d been called into Possum Springs, either. Bea, realizing all eyes were on her, sighed and stood up from her spot on the couch. She removed the dummy cigarette from between her lips and stashed it away.

“I need Jackie’s help with something else,” Bea said vaguely. “I just figured I’d surprise you, considering you’re always surprising me.”

Mae wasn’t sure if that was meant as a compliment or not. Bea had been too deadpan to really tell.

“What do you need help with?” Mae asked.

Bea was silent. She gestured for Jackie to follow her on her way to the front door. Jackie, who looked about as confused as Mae, got up and followed after her. By the time the two visitors reached the exit, Bea apparently realized she couldn’t put off giving Mae an answer any longer.

“It’s nothing important,” Bea said dismissively.

Mae knew that, when she said it ‘wasn’t important’, Bea really meant it ‘wasn’t Mae’s business.’ Normally, Mae would have kept trying to get an answer. Considering Bea had gone out of her way to do something for her, though, Mae decided not to press the matter. Not until later, at least.

The front door opened to the cool February air, and soon shut behind Bea and Jackie. Mae was left alone in the house, silent save for the ambient noise that all houses seemed to have. Soon, the sound of a car leaving the driveway told Mae that she was truly all by herself.

Mae still didn’t know if it was okay to keep wearing the jeans she had on.

* * *

 It didn’t take very long for Mae to go stir-crazy, and soon she was back to jumping around town and walking on powerlines. To be specific, it took exactly a day. The day after Jackie and Bea’s surprise visit, Mae decided she was too bored to be scared. After waking up and saying goodbye to her mom, Mae rushed over to the Snack Falcon to say hi to Gregg.

It turned out it was apparently Valentine’s Day. Who knew? Mae hadn’t seen her parents so far, so she hadn’t gotten any cards or candy from them. Mae hadn’t realized it was Valentine’s Day until she saw the displays in the Snack Falcon.

Gregg gave Mae a card that read ‘YOU’RE ALWAYS IN MY HEART’. The word letters ‘HE’ in the word ‘heart’ had been crossed out and replaced with a capital F. Mae pretended that it was really funny so as to avoid upsetting Gregg.

The fact that it was Valentine’s Day meant that Mae’s plans to hang out with Gregg would have to be put on hold. He was actually in a relationship, after all, and probably had a bunch of plans with Angus. A bunch of sex plans. Probably.

Hanging out with Bea wasn’t an option, either. The Pickaxe was already closed when Mae went to check up on her, and that meant Bea was probably at home, doing bills or binge watching TV.

Even Germ wasn’t around to hang out with. The parking lots were even emptier than usual when Mae went looking for him. Mae briefly found herself wondering if Germ was actually on a date for Valentine’s Day. The idea of Germ going out with someone was a little too weird, though. Mae had a hard enough time picturing Germ as someone who slept, let alone went on dates.

And so, with pretty much nothing to do, Mae went home early. If there was nobody to hang out with, Mae figured she could at least get on the computer to play some Demontower.

When Mae opened her laptop, though, a notification in the messenger system was waiting for her. Someone with the username ‘PNKSNGIRLS’ had sent a contact request through Chattrbox.

It had been a long time since someone had sent Mae a contact request. In fact, Mae was pretty sure that the last person Mae had added on messenger was Angus. That had been two or three years ago. Mae couldn’t immediately think of who PNKSNGIRLS could be.

It only took a few seconds for the realization to come to Mae. It was her—the Bombshell. Jackie had actually gotten them in contact with each other. Mae almost couldn’t believe it.

Mae stared at the notification on her laptop’s screen for what felt like forever. She had to seriously fight the urge to ignore the contact request. Talking to normal people was exhausting enough—talking to someone Mae was interested in would be a million times worth. The anxiety was so bad that Mae almost wanted to shut off her laptop and just hide in her bed forever.

Mae took a deep breath. Hiding wasn’t an option, no matter how tempting it was. Mae couldn’t keep hiding from life, or from weird tattooed guys out in the street. Mae had no idea how well this would turn out, but good or bad, it was something she needed to do.

Mae slowly moved her cursor over to the notification and clicked the ‘Accept’ option. PNKSNGIRLS’s icon, a pink pentagram, appeared on Mae’s desktop, right below Angus’s icon.

Swallowing her fear, Mae put her hands on the keyboard and began to type.


	8. The Graduation Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mae remembers a talk with Casey. Someone gets beer spat at them.

_In June of 2015, Possum Springs was more or less the same as Possum Springs in 2018. Possum Springs never changed very much, after all. Names, faces, and businesses may have been different, but the more things changed, the more they stayed the same. Even something as big as a high school graduation didn’t change the way the town felt._

_Mae didn’t know how graduating was supposed to make her feel. Relieved? Proud? Mostly she just felt tired after sitting out in the sun all day in that heavy-ass robe and cap. Graduation seemed like it should have been some big event; but instead, it was just a thing that happened._

_People had come. People had talked. Some nerd got up there and gave a speech about moving forward or whatever._

_Some of the graduates had beach balls, though, and that was pretty cool._

_Mae’s parents had been so proud. Mae didn’t really know why—it didn’t feel like she’d accomplished anything. She’d just gone to school and avoided dying. Really, Mae had put in the barest minimum effort required for graduating from high school._

_But the parents were happy, and Mae guessed that was nice enough. They had taken Mae out of town to get dinner at some fancy Chinese place. Mae ate until she nearly got sick._

_The real celebration came later that night, though. At 10 o’clock, Casey pulled up to Mae’s house in his old pickup truck. Gregg and Angus were riding in the backseat, cuddled up with each other. Mae wished her parents good night, got into the truck, and soon the gang was off to party in the state forest._

_There were a couple of parties going on to celebrate graduation. One or two of them were being held in other towns, at clubs or whatever. Some of the sketchier kids were partying in an abandoned house or something, and the football team had reserved Pastabilities for their celebration._

_But Mae was going to the cool party. The cool party was in the cool woods, and most of the cool kids would be there._

_By the time Mae and the gang arrived, the party had already started. Somebody had set up a speaker system and was playing a bunch of alt rock; somebody else had set up a whole keg of beer. A big bonfire was going, because no party was complete unless there was a serious risk of starting a forest fire._

_Mae and her friends spent the first few minutes of the party mingling with everyone else. Everyone went on and on about how weird it felt to be done with high school, or about how they’d miss everyone. People talked about college, or the army, or how excited they were to get out of Possum Springs._

_Mae just smiled and nodded the whole time. She could only kind of empathize with what everyone was saying. Possum Springs was home for Mae, and she felt like she’d miss it when she went to college. Sure, she’d be getting an education and doing adult stuff, but would Durkillesburg ever feel anything like Possum Springs?_

_Casey, on the other hand, was already talking about how he was going to hop on a train and ditch Possum Springs. He kept saying he’d get a job on a fishing boat, or that he’d go work for his uncle out-of-state._

_Mae wasn’t sure how much of what Casey said was just talk and how much of it he actually believed._

_After just a few minutes of talking with people, Mae was exhausted. She made her way over to the table of snacks that had been set up next to the beer keg. Gregg and the others were close behind, apparently also in the mood for snacks. Either that, or they just weren’t ready to go do their own things._

_“Wish we could’ve had this party on the beach or something,” Gregg mused as he helped himself to a handful of stale pretzels._

_“The closest beach is half a day away, Bug,” Angus pointed out. “Unless you mean a lake, or something… What’s wrong with the woods, though? You usually love the woods.”_

_“Yeah, the woods are great! They’re full of witches and ghosts. Beaches don’t have those.” Mae grabbed a red, plastic cup and absentmindedly filled it up with whatever was in the beer keg. It turned out to be beer, much to Mae’s surprise. Mae shrugged and lifted the cup to her lips._

_“Whoa, hold on,” Casey said, lifting a hand in Mae’s direction. “Mae, have you ever had beer before? Take it slow—you might not like it at first.”_

_While Mae appreciated that Casey was looking out for her, she wasn’t sure she liked the fact that she was getting advice on drinking from someone younger than her. Then again, they were all underage… But they were also high school graduates, so technically they were adults. They could do anything and not get in trouble, right?_

_Mae lifted the cup to her mouth and took a big old gulp of adult beer._

_Mae didn’t swallow the beer right away. She contemplated the taste for a couple of seconds, the beer swishing against her cheeks and tongue. It was incredibly bitter, as Mae had always suspected. Just having the beer in her mouth was making Mae’s eyes water._

_It didn’t take Mae particularly long to decide that this was the worst thing ever._

_Mae turned her head away from her friends and spat out her mouthful of beer. The heavily watered-down beer splashed all over someone who’d been standing nearby. Their back was turned, thankfully, so none of the beer got on their face. Instead, it simply splashed all over their hoodie and the back of their head._

_“Oh god,” Mae muttered as Gregg began cackling behind her. “Sorry, Levy.”_

_Levy didn’t respond in words. A low, horrified moan of disgust came out of him as he turned around to face Mae._

_“GodDAMMIT!” Levy began tearing his hoodie off, not even bothering to unzip it as he yanked it over his head. The t-shirt he wore underneath looked like it was soaked, too. “God effing dammit! First the thing in middle school and now this?! Eff you, Borowski!”_

_Levy ran off into the woods, his hoodie still pulled up over his head._

_Mae watched in silence as the town’s weed hookup ran away. Mae felt like she should have felt bad about spitting all over Levy, but instead she just felt embarrassed. That was probably kind of shitty, huh?_

_A hand clapped Mae on the shoulder in what was probably supposed to be a reassuring manner. Instead, it just sort of hurt. Mae looked over to the hand’s owner and saw Casey smirking smugly at her._

_“What?” Mae asked irritably._

_Casey’s smugness just increased. He slapped Mae’s shoulder again (Again, it hurt) and stepped back to join Gregg and Angus. Gregg’s laughter at Mae’s beer fiasco was finally dying down._

_“Oh, man!” Gregg sighed. “Jeez, Mae, how come stuff like this keeps happening to you? Were you cursed or something?”_

_Mae sometimes wondered about that herself. If she had been cursed, the warlock who’d cursed her must have been super lame. Instead of cursing her with something cool, Mae had just been cursed to have a bunch of awkward stuff happen to her. That wasn’t very imaginative, warlock—work harder next time._

_“You’re gonna be the one who’s cursed, Greggory,” Mae said, attempting some sort of threat._

_Nobody really understood what she meant by that, though, so they just ignored her._

* * *

  _The party hadn’t been going on for very long by the time Mae got tired of it. She’d had a long day, after all, and socializing was exhausting even on normal days. Before Mae even knew it, she was waiting by Casey’s pickup truck, anxious to leave._

_It wasn’t like this was a bad party. The music was decent, and aside from spitting beer all over Levy, Mae hadn’t done anything to embarrass herself. Everyone was in a good mood and having a good time. It was definitely one of the better parties Mae had been to lately._

_That didn’t change how Mae felt, though. Something was…_

_Whatever._

_Who cared what the reason was? Mae didn’t need excuses for herself. If she was tired, she was tired. Trying to figure out why she was tired just made Mae feel bad. She’d leave the psychoanalyzing shit to Dr. Hank, along with family medicine and orthodontics._

_Mae scanned the faces of her fellow graduates who stood in the clearing with the bonfire. Their conversations all blended together, mixing with the Appalachian folk music playing from the stereo._

_Mae wondered how many of her classmates she’d ever see again. How many would just move to some big city and never come back? Would any of them even remember Mae? Would any of them want to remember her?_

_Hell, Mae didn’t even want to remember herself sometimes. She didn’t feel like she was a very good person._

_Mae sighed and leaned against the hood of Casey’s truck. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see someone approaching her. Mae was worried it was someone coming to ask about the softball incident; someone who just had to know why she’d done it before they left for college._

_That was assuming the worst, though, wasn’t it? Mae turned towards the person walking towards her. She was, all at once, both relieved and mortified._

_It was Josh. Josh, the tractor guy. Josh, the farm-boy. Josh, the brave hero who’d driven Mae home after that disastrous night at prom. Mae barely knew anything about Josh, but she felt like she was indebted to him for life after that. Mae felt like Josh was the sort of person she’d tell her grandkids about._

_Not that Mae would ever have grandkids, of course. Kids were awful and babies were gross._

_“Heya, Mae!” Josh said cheerfully. Even though he was a few feet away, Mae could smell alcohol and chewing tobacco on his breath. Despite the unpleasant odor, Josh had a big, friendly smile on his face that made Mae feel a little better._

_“Yeah, hey.” Mae wasn’t sure what else to say. She hadn’t actually spoken to Josh since the day after prom. He may have saved her, sure, but that didn’t mean they were friends._

_“Graduation, right?” Josh said, raising a red plastic cup full of beer up as he spoke._

_“Yup,” Mae agreed. “We’ve definitely graduated.”_

_“Yeah, I know!” Josh exclaimed. “I mean, shit, y’know? I didn’t think I’d even stick around through senior year—thought I’d just drop out and start workin’ on the farm! Look at me now, though!”_

_Mae could definitely relate to that._

_“I thought about dropping out and becoming a shut-in, like, a bunch of times,” Mae said. “Ever since middle school, at least. Especially when I took all that time off after the softball thing.”_

_“I’m gonna drive my tractor out to Bright Harbor!” Josh exclaimed. Mae couldn’t tell if he had ignored her mention of the softball incident or if he just wasn’t paying attention. “Buy some cheap weed. Maybe finally get laid. You ever gotten laid, Mae?”_

_“That’s not really something you ask someone, Josh,” Mae pointed out. “Are you, uh… drunk?”_

_Josh gave Mae a look of confusion, as if Mae had just asked him if he had two heads._

_“I can’t be drunk,” Josh said. He slurred and paused between every other word, as if he could barely remember how to speak. “I only been drinkin’ beer. Can’t get drunk off beer, Mae. You’d know that if you drank more.”_

_Mae, who could still remember the days when her dad drank heavily, knew that you absolutely could get drunk off beer. Mae wasn’t sure how anyone could tolerate the taste of beer enough to get that drunk, though. Had the people who enjoyed beer just gotten used to its nastiness, or did they just not care?_

_Mae could still taste the beer from earlier. Even though most of it had wound up on Levy, Mae still felt like she’d drunken too much._

_“So are you heading off to college?” Mae asked, trying to get her mind off of beer._

_Josh shrugged. “Prob’ly! Community college, anyway.”_

_Mae barely knew what community college was. She’d never been curious enough to look it up. Mae assumed that it was college for dumb people, or for people who couldn’t get into regular college. It was probably like those remedial classes Mae had taken, only you had to pay to get into it._

_“So, hey,” Mae said, “did I ever thank you for driving me home from prom?”_

_“Yup,” Josh said. “You were crying a bunch when you did it, though.”_

_“Oh,” Mae said. She glanced off to the side awkwardly._

_This conversation was going down the toilet. Thankfully, Casey arrived just in time to save Mae from any further awkwardness. He seemed to arrive out of nowhere—Mae hadn’t seen him leave the clearing where the party was._

_“Hey, y’all,” Casey said as he walked up towards the pickup truck. His hands were stuffed into his hoodie’s pockets, despite how warm it was from the fire._

_“Oh, hey, uh…” Josh stared at Casey uncertainly. His voice continued trailing off as he blanked on Casey’s name. It wasn’t surprising—Casey didn’t socialize with too many people outside his circle of friends. Unless something really bad happened, most people in Possum Springs would never know Casey’s name._

_“Hartley,” Casey said. “Casey Hartley.”_

_Josh’s eyes lit up in recognition. “Oh, right! Heartbreak Hartley! You’re the guy who dumped all those girls, right?”_

_Casey winced for just a moment. He tried to laugh off Josh’s statement, but it came off sounding unnatural. The rumors about Casey were one of the few things that could actually get through his armor of apathy._

_“That’s all a big misunderstanding,” Casey said, trying to brush off Josh’s claims. “Anyway, can I talk to Mae alone for a little while? I wanna check up on something with her.”_

_“Yeah, sure!” Josh slurred. Then, a thought occurred to his drunken mind. “Oh, hey, Casey, did you know we graduated?”_

_“Yeah, actually!” Casey said cheerfully, his voice completely sincere._

_Josh nodded slowly and clumsily. “Well, okay—I just wanted you to know that.”_

_Josh drunkenly stumbled back to the clearing. Mae watched as the brave, selfless hero who’d saved her from the world’s worst prom night helped himself to another cup of beer. She then watched as he drunkenly attempted to urinate on the bonfire in the middle of the clearing._

_Josh was a real hero._

_Mae turned back to Casey, who had climbed up onto the hood of his truck. He was staring up at the branches of the trees above them, brief patches of night sky poking through the leaves. Though he offered no invitation, Mae climbed up onto the hood and sat beside him. There wasn’t much room, but Mae was fairly tiny._

_Mae watched Casey watch the sky for a few seconds. He was being unusually quiet, especially considering he’d said he wanted to talk with Mae. Mae supposed it was possible Casey had just lied about that to get Josh to leave Mae alone, but Casey wasn’t really observant enough to pull off something like that. Instead, Mae decided that Casey was being quiet because he was lost in thought._

_That being the case, Mae guessed she would be the one to break the silence._

_“What’d you wanna talk about?” Mae asked._

_Casey responded with a heavy sigh. He looked down at his ratty jeans and his tattered, skater-boy sneakers. Most of Casey’s clothes looked like they were from a secondhand store. Mae didn’t know for sure if that was the case, though—she’d never asked, either. It wasn’t any of her business, after all._

_“Can I ask you something?” Casey asked after a moment. His voice was unusually serious. “Do you think that I’m like my dad?”_

_“Huh?” Mae asked. The question had been so surprising that Mae assumed she’d misheard._

_“Remember how, a month ago, I got fired from the Food Donkey?”_

_Mae didn’t remember, but she nodded her head anyway._

_“Well, I guess I kinda deserved to get fired,” Casey confessed. “I was slacking off a lot. I half-assed a lot of the stuff I was s’posed to do, too. My boss was real pissed off at me when he finally fired me.”_

_Mae frowned. She still wasn’t quite following. Casey didn’t appear to notice her confusion, though._

_“When he finally fired me…” Casey stopped, chuckling bitterly. “You know what he said? He said, ‘I really expected better from you, Casey’. Then I went home, and I told my mom, and she just… gave me this look, you know? This real disappointed frown.”_

_Casey sighed. “Look, my dad could never hold down a job for long. I remember he went through a buncha jobs before he died. And every time he told my ma that he’d gotten laid off, she’d just give him this look… And it was the same look she gave me after I got fired from the Food Donkey.”_

_Casey stopped thoughtfully, a worried look on his face._

_“Mae… If I stay in Possum Springs, do you think I’ll turn out like my dad? Just some shitty, deadbeat asshole who screams at everyone?”_

_Casey’s voice cracked when he spoke. He sounded as if he were close to crying. Mae couldn’t see his face in the dark of the night, but she was willing to bet he was starting to tear up._

_“Dude, no!” Mae insisted. “You’re way better than your dad ever was, Casey! You’re super chill, and cool, and I’ve never heard you scream at someone even once! You’re ten times cooler than your douchebag dad was!”_

_No response. Mae continued._

_“Like, you’re nice, and awesome, and…” Mae threw her hands up. “Like, you help people all the time! What’s the nicest thing your dad ever did? He built your treehouse and left you his boat. Plus, he had to die for him to bother to do the second one. But you do all sorts of stuff whenever Gregg or me need help! Your dad was an asshole; you’re not!”_

_Casey was very quiet. Whether he was contemplating Mae’s words or just didn’t know what to say, Mae wasn’t sure. Mae was a little worried that her words hadn’t had the effect she’d wanted. She didn’t feel like she was the best person to talk to about issues you were having._

_After a few more seconds of silence, Casey finally turned back to Mae._

_“You know, Margaret, you really shouldn’t insult someone’s dad like that. You should respect your elders.” Casey smirked playfully._

_Mae felt so relieved that Casey was in a better mood that she couldn’t help but laugh. Casey chuckled along with her. Soon, though, the laughter died down, and both of them returned their attention to the leaves and branches up above them. Under the thick canopy of the state forest, the night sky seemed almost starless. The woods had a quiet, almost dreamlike quality to them in that moment._

_“I still gotta get out of this town, though.” Casey said, almost to himself. “I’ll hop on a train and go somewhere where things actually happen.”_

_“Things happen in Possum Springs!” Mae pointed out. Even when she said it, though, she knew it wasn’t really true. Things used to happen in Possum Springs. Nowadays, it just felt like things stopped happening._

_Casey was evidently in agreement with that sentiment. “Things die in Possum Springs, Mae. That’s it. It’s like the rest of the world keeps moving forward, but places like Possum Springs get left behind to get old and rust away._

_“I’m not gonna stay in some shitty, dying town,” Casey murmured. “I’m gonna get outta Possum Springs if it’s the last thing I do.”_

_For some reason, the seriousness in Casey’s voice was starting to get to Mae. Mae wasn’t used to this kind of intensity from Casey. Then again, graduating had probably given him a lot of stuff to think about. It wasn’t really unusual, then, for him to be sounding so serious._

_Casey either noticed how uncomfortable Mae was or wanted to change the topic of conversation himself. He chuckled nonchalantly, and turned towards Mae._

_“Didn’t mean to get all serious and shit,” Casey laughed. “You’ve probably got a lot on your mind, too, huh?”_

_Mae shrugged. She always had a lot on her mind. Graduating hadn’t really increased or decreased Mae’s anxiety levels at all._

_“How have things been going for you, anyway?” Casey asked. “Like, how are things with that girl you’ve been chatting with?”_

_“Who, the Bombshell?” Mae asked, surprised. “Pretty good, actually. She’s, like, really cool and funny and stuff. I really owe Jackie for getting us in touch with each other. I mean, I actually know her name now, so I think that’s a sign that things are improving.”_

_Mae laughed. Then, puzzled, she stopped. A thought occurred to her._

_“Wait, hang on… How do you know about that? I didn’t even meet the Bombshell until after you died, Casey.”_

_Casey stared at Mae in silence. He looked as if he wasn’t sure why Mae was bothering to ask a question like that. It was like she’d just asked where he’d gotten hid hoodie, or if he wanted to see a movie later. Mae guessed that the question probably wasn’t too important to Casey, considering he was dead, but it was still kind of rude of him to brush it off._

_Wait. No, that didn’t make sense._

_A strange, falling sensation began to come over Mae. In the distance, the music playing from the clearing came to a sudden, dying stop. As Mae looked up at the stars shining through the leaves above, realization dawned on her._

_“Oh, god damn it!” Mae said irritably. “Is this a—”_

* * *

 Mae woke up.

Warm sunlight poured in from the attic’s window and washed over Mae’s face, as if the sun was trying to slap Mae awake. The sheets on Mae’s futon smelled vaguely of sweat—a sign that laundry would have to be done soon. Mae’s foot brushed up against something, and she quickly realized she’d fallen asleep with one boot still on.

Mae had no idea how that had happened, but she was too groggy to really care.

Mae could still vividly remember the dream she’d woken up from. As far as her dreams went, this one had been fairly easy to understand; no spooky statues or ghostly musicians. Just a vague recreation of the graduation party Mae had gone to.

The dream hadn’t been exactly like the actual graduation party, of course. The party Mae had gone to was up near Pill Hill, not in the woods. Gregg and Angus hadn’t been there, either—it had just been Mae and Casey.

Mae had definitely spat a mouthful of beer all over Levy, though—that part was accurate.

Mae sat up in her bed, smacking her dry lips tiredly. She felt gross all over, but wasn’t sure exactly why. Had she slept in even later than usual? Were her clothes starting to get really, really funky? Had Mae eaten too much pizza the other night?

Eh. It was probably a little of all of the above.

Aside from all of that, though, Mae was a little uneasy. She couldn’t quite think of why. Mae almost felt like she’d missed out on the chance to do something in her dream—something important. Mae wondered if she should have maybe asked Casey something, or warned him about the cultists. It wouldn’t have changed anything, of course, but it might have Mae Mae feel better.

Mae groaned. Why were dreams always so dumb?

Still sleepy, Mae hopped out of bed and quickly set up her laptop. There wasn’t much of note in the Chattrbox newsfeed—just a drug bust in Bright Harbor. A few messages from everyone (Bombshell included—she and Mae had been chatting a lot the last few days) told Mae what her friends were up to that day. Gregg had evidently decided that today was a good day for band practice.

Mae was okay with that. Struggling to play a song she didn’t know would probably help get her mind off of things. Or onto things. In any case, the music would do stuff.

Mae hurried downstairs, not sure just how late she might have slept in. Candy Borowski was still in the kitchen when Mae got to the ground floor, so that was a good sign. That meant Mae hadn’t slept through band practice again. It also meant Mae had time to check in on her mom.

“Good morning, sleeping beauty!” Mae’s mom was as cheerful as ever when she saw Mae enter the kitchen. A book of true crime stories was open in front of her.

“I mean, it’s the afternoon,” Mae pointed out as she hopped up onto the kitchen counter. “Also, I’m not asleep. You’re making all sortsa mistakes today, mom.”

“I’m allowed to, honey—I’m only human,” Mae’s mom, the big talking cat, said. “Only God doesn’t make mistakes, sweetie.”

Mae didn’t know if she agreed with that. If God did exist, they’d kind of done a real boner of a job making the world a good place. Or maybe God had meant to make the world awful, in which case they’d done pretty well.

“So, any big plans for today?” Mae’s mom asked, her eyes returning to the book she had open in front of her.

Mae could only shrug. “Gregg wants to do band practice today. So I guess I’ll be heading out for that soon.”

“I am so glad you’re getting out of the house again!” Mae’s mom said enthusiastically. “Your father and I were very worried when you locked yourself up in your room! Whatever Bea and her little friend did to get you out of the doldrums certainly worked!”

Mae didn’t have the heart to tell her mom that the reason she’d actually stopped staying in the house all day was because she had gotten bored. It was better for Candy Borowski to think that her daughter’s friends had helped her than to think her daughter was just kind of inconsistent.

“Hey, speaking of which, has Aunt Molly mentioned anything about that guy?” Mae asked. “You know, the tattoo stalker?”

Mae’s mom’s smile shrank away into a small frown.

“She says that he hasn’t showed up since he harassed you outside of the Pickaxe.”

“Oh, good,” Mae said, unsure if that was actually good or not.

“She still wants you to be careful around town,” Mae’s mother cautioned. “Don’t stay out too late, and make sure you’re with friends if you do.”

“Aunt Mall Cop always wants me to do that stuff, though,” Mae pointed out. “The presence or absence of a weird tattoo man wouldn’t change her advice at all.”

“She’s just looking out for you,” Mae’s mom said. She didn’t say anything else, though—Mae and her mother had had this conversation pretty much a million times. Mae wasn’t going to suddenly be super appreciative of her aunt’s advice after all this time.

There was something on Mae’s mind, though.

“Hey, so…” Mae paused, unsure of where to go with this. “Do you remember my friend Casey Hartley?”

Candy Borowski looked thoughtful for a moment. “I think so, sweetie. Wasn’t he your little friend from Sunday School?”

“Yeah, that was him,” Mae chuckled. Of course her mom would remember Casey in some way that involved church. Also, to Candy Borwoski, all of her daughter’s friends were ‘little friends’, even though most of them were bigger than Mae herself. In fact, pretty much all of Mae’s friends were taller than her.

Except Germ. Germ was tiny.

“You know about him, uh…” Mae’s voice trailed off. She knew she wanted to talk about Casey disappearing, but she had trouble lying about it to her mom. In fact, she had trouble lying about it to anyone—that’s why Mae almost never brought Casey up unless it was with her friends.

Thankfully, Mom Borowski understood what Mae wanted to say.

“The missing posters, right?” She asked. “Yes, I know. After he went missing, Casey’s mother and father would come up to the church to ask if anyone had seen him. After a while, though, they stopped coming.”

Candy Borowski shook her head sadly. “Those poor people. Abby Crangler told me that Casey probably ran away, but I don’t think that’s very likely. Casey didn’t seem like the sort of boy who’d put his mother through that kind of heartbreak.”

The word ‘heartbreak’ instantly gave Mae a flashback to her dream.

In that dream, Josh had called Casey ‘Heartbreak Hartley’, which was one of the stupidest nicknames Mae could think of. Kids in high school usually didn’t go for clever, alliterative titles when coming up with insulting nicknames. They usually just stuck with cuss words or slurs.

So why had Mae dreamed it? Was it because of the rumors from high school? If so, why was Mae thinking about those?

It was probably just because Casey had been on Mae’s mind quite a bit lately. It was hard to think about Casey without thinking of some of the stuff people had said about him.

Mae’s mother fixed her daughter with a worried look. To her embarrassment, Mae realized she’d been sitting in complete silence.

“Honey, are you okay?” Mae’s mother asked. “I know I said I’m glad you’re getting out of the house, but maybe you should take it easy today. You’ve been sleeping even more than usual lately.”

Mae shook her head. “No, no. I’m fine. Just… thinking about stuff.”

Mae’s mom looked like she wasn’t satisfied with that answer, but was willing to accept it anyway. Mae didn’t blame her for being worried. Mae felt like she gave her parents a lot to worry about.

“Well, okay,” Candy Borowski said. “But like I said, be careful. And if you see that man who was following you, just hurry back home.”

“No arguments here,” Mae said. She hopped down from the kitchen counter, grunting a bit as her feet hit the floor. She was still awfully groggy from sleeping in later than usual.

“Alright, sweetie,” Mae’s mom said. “Have fun at band practice. I love you.”

Mae felt herself begin to smile. “Love you, too, mom.”

With that, Mae turned and left the house. She could be depressed or scared later. Right now, she had a life to live.


	9. The Tattoo Man

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mae answers some questions. Bea does a protection.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the delay. Have been feeling a bit burnt out lately. Lack of new NITW content can do that, y'know? I wanna thank everyone who leaves comments-- you guys are why I can keep myself motivated. Seriously, you rock.

“The trick to playing the guitar,” Gregg said as he tuned his instrument, “is that you can’t get too attached to any of your guitar picks.”

The Party Barn was as dirty and dusty as always on that February evening. The dying sunlight from outside could barely be seen through the filthy windows up front. Angus and Bea had both already set up their equipment on the Party Barn’s stage, and Gregg was sitting on some old boxes tuning his instrument. Germ was standing next to the backdoor, wordlessly watching as the band waited for their fourth member to show up.

“You gotta stay emotionally distant from ‘em,” Gregg said, strumming his guitar while he spoke. “If you’ve got a guitar pick, you’ve gotta assume that you’re gonna lose it eventually.”

“Uh-huh,” Bea said absent-mindedly. All of her focus was on her computer. The drumming software that she used was open and ready to go. Bea briefly wondered if she should set the software up so she could play the bass parts, too, just in case Mae wound up not coming. It would take a little while to do, but Mae was running pretty late—if she wound up not showing up, it would be smart to start setting it up now.

“I’ve lost dozens of the things,” Gregg said. “This place is probably littered with my old guitar picks. But do I get upset about it? Nope.”

“He used to get upset about them,” Angus added. “Like, really upset.”

“Yeah, I cried once!” Gregg said.

Bea didn’t say anything. She wasn’t really paying attention. Bea had had a lot on her mind lately. Jackie’s visit had helped to put some of Bea’s worries to rest, but there was still a lot that Bea was concerned about. Hopefully, band practice would help with some of that. But probably not.

A creaky, scraping noise cut through Bea’s focus. The Party Barn’s back door scraped against the doorframe as someone outside tried to force it open. After a few attempts, the door finally became unstuck and slammed open. Mae Borowski walked into the Party Barn, and the door creaked shut behind her.

“’Sup, dorks?” Mae asked as she strolled up towards the stage.

“You’re late,” Bea replied. “Like, really late. We were going to start without you.”

Gregg blinked, surprised. “Wait, we were?”

Mae winced, and a guilty chuckle escaped her. “Yeah, sorry. I had this weird dream last night and overslept. Plus, I stopped on the way over to say hi to Selmers, and Mr. Chazokov, and this one guy who I talk to about the news through his window…”

Bea knew Mae well enough to know that she wasn’t joking. Bea wasn’t sure why Mae apparently talked to literally everyone she saw in the street, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to know. Sometimes the reason for something didn’t matter, after all.

Mae’s expression returned to neutral as she hopped up to sit on the stage. She looked around at her friends, stopped for a moment when she realized Germ was there, and then shrugged. It looked like Mae was just starting to accept the fact that Germ just showed up at random sometimes.

“What was your weird dream about?” Gregg asked. “Last night I had a dream where Cap’n and I got a pet cat. But for some reason we kept treating it like it was a dog? And for some reason we were living in my parents’ house, but my parents weren’t anywhere around?”

“I had a dream where I was in this big house,” Germ said as he approached the stage. “And there were all these hallways. And I kept hearing my sisters calling for me, but I never got any closer to ‘em. And I knew that if I didn’t fine ‘em, they’d be in real trouble. But I didn’t find ‘em.”

Bea stared at Germ in mild concern. “That… sounds like a pretty bad dream.”

“It wasn’t great,” Germ said, his tone unchanging.

Mae gave a small, apathetic shrug and looked down at her boots. It was pretty clear to Bea that Mae didn’t want to talk about this dream. Mae didn’t exactly have a great filter, though—it was no surprise she was forcing herself to talk.

“It was just this dumb thing about Casey,” Mae sighed reluctantly. “We were at our graduation party, and we talked about his dad and stuff. And it felt so real, like… If I’d warned Casey about how he was gonna die, it felt like it would’ve changed things. And even though I know that’s not true, I still feel bad that I didn’t tell him.”

Mae fell silent. Nobody looked like they knew what to say. Bea took it upon herself to ask the obvious question.

“Are you feeling okay?” Bea asked worriedly.

She couldn’t help but worry—Bea had already seen Mae go through one breakdown. Now Bea found herself constantly worrying that it would happen again. It didn’t help that Mae kept having bad stuff happen to her.

Mae continued contemplating her boots, not saying anything. After a few seconds, she shook her head and looked up.

“Yeah,” Mae said. “No. Whatever. Look, what song are we playing today?”

Bea didn’t need to be a therapist to see that Mae was trying to brush it off. But Bea knew better than to try and press the issue. If something really was bothering Mae, it would be a lot more obvious. As such, Bea didn’t need to ask Mae if she was certain.

And in any case, Bea wouldn’t have gotten a chance to ask, because the loud, metallic sound of someone pounding on the Barn’s backdoor suddenly cut into the group’s conversation. Three loud, furious knocks were followed by three more. The knocking grew louder and more intense while everyone stared at the door in confusion.

“Who’s—” Mae started to ask, only to be interrupted by the door being kicked open.

“Goddamn door!” A voice Bea didn’t recognize cried out. There was a hiss of pain as the voice’s owner hobbled into the Party Barn. The strange man’s ankle, obviously sore after kicking the door open, limped a bit behind him, but the man gritted his teeth and overcame his pain. The man looked gruff, his chin and cheeks covered in messy stubble. A heavy, dirty flannel coat hung off of his frame. The man had an angry, impatient scowl on his face.

But Bea didn’t really notice his expression—her eyes were focused on the tribal tattoo on his face.

 

* * *

 

  
As usual, leaving the house had been a huge mistake.

Mae had seriously been tempted to stay in today. She’d woken up from her dream about the graduation party feeling like total crap. On top of that, Mae had woken up with one of her boots on. Waking up with a single boot still on your foot should be a sure sign not to go out, right?

But no, Mae had to go out and be social, and all that garbage. Now the creepy guy who’d been stalking her had crashed band practice. Smart, Mae—real smart.

The tattoo man stepped into the Party Barn, the backdoor squealing shut behind him. He came to a stop in the middle of the store and took a moment to look around, studying Mae and her friends. He looked like he was taking them in—trying to determine if they were a threat or not. Whatever conclusion he came to wasn’t clear, though—he simply stopped looking around and stared straight at Mae.

The two stared at each other in silence for a while. Mae didn’t want to talk and risk saying smartass that might piss him off. With her lack of filter, that was a very real possibility. Thankfully, Mae had friends who could speak up for her.

“Hey, you can’t come in here. This is someone else’s property,” Gregg said. He didn’t sound terribly concerned—either he didn’t know that this was the guy who’d been following Mae, or he didn’t care.

Mae swallowed her fear and spoke up. “What’re you doing in here?”

The tattoo man narrowed his eyes at Mae, clearly irritated. It looked like Mae didn’t need to worry about saying something smartass. Apparently, anything she said was going to piss this guy off.

“You never answered my questions, dumbass,” The tattoo man growled. “Why the eff else would I be here?”

Okay, Mae had asked kind of a stupid question. She should have guessed that the tattoo man still wanted to know about the Casey thing. It had kind of been naïve of Mae to assume he wouldn’t come asking about it sooner or later. Mae was beginning to think she didn’t put much forethought into things.

However, while Mae hadn’t been prepared for this encounter with the tattoo man, Bea was.

Before Mae knew what was happening, Bea had jumped down from the stage and stepped between Mae and the tattoo man. Bea was holding something small and black in her hand and was holding it up to the tattoo man’s face. The tattoo man had a look of surprise on his face, like he’d completely forgotten there were other people in the building.

“Get away from her, asshole,” Bea said. “I will personally Mace the shit out of you if you bother my friend again.”

The tattoo man took a moment to study the small, black canister that Bea was holding up to his face. When he confirmed that it was indeed Mace, his irritated scowl returned. He made no motion to swat the Mace away or push Bea aside, though—his body language was slow and cautious.

“Wait, is this this guy who was creeping on you?” Gregg asked suspiciously. His guitar had been set aside, and he was making his way towards Bea and Mae. He stood beside Bea, protectively standing in front of Mae. Before Mae knew it, Germ and Angus had both wordlessly joined the others. Her four friends had formed a little wall between Mae and the tattoo man.

Mae found herself suddenly feeling so much love for her friends that she thought she might cry.

The tattoo man didn’t look like he was going to cry. He looked like he wanted to break something.

“… The eff’s wrong with people in this town?!” The tattoo man snapped. “Goddammit! I’m just trying to ask some effing questions, but y’all are acting like I’m trying to eat your friend! I don’t even got a gun or nothing, assholes! I ain’t done nothing wrong!”

“You’ve been stalking her!” Gregg pointed out.

“Yeah, but not in, like, a pervy way!” The tattoo man retorted angrily. “I’m not following her ‘cause I’m a creep!”

“That’s nice and all, but it’s kind of beside the point,” Angus pointed out. His tone was stern and serious, but not entirely angry. Angus didn’t anger very easily, after all, and so far the tattoo man hadn’t earned any vitriol from the big guy. “Stalking is still illegal. You’re lucky we’re letting you talk at all.”

The tattoo man opened his mouth to speak, but stopped. Mae watched as the man who’d been following her lifted his hands up, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. When he opened his eyes and spoke again, his voice was much quieter and calmer. The angry scowl had disappeared from his face, but it looked like it physically pained him to not be pissed off at everyone.

“Okay,” the tattoo man said. “Alright. Fine. I’ve been following your friend. That’s kind of creepy. You’ve got me there. But I legitimately only want to ask you people some questions, alright? You answer my questions, I disappear from your lives.”

Mae looked at the man’s face with great uncertainty. While he was clearly trying to put in an effort to appear reasonable and personable, it wasn’t really working. There was a look of barely contained rage in the tattoo man’s eyes. Mae had a feeling that, even if he had no intention of hurting Mae and her friends, his anger would drive him to hurt someone, somewhere.

Bea evidently was thinking the same thing—she hadn’t stopped pointing her Mace at the tattoo man’s eyes.

“You have seriously got 10 seconds to get out of here,” Bea said. “If you want to ask questions, you do it like a normal person, instead of scaring people half to death.”

Gregg nodded in agreement. Although he wasn’t as active in trying to ward off the tattoo man, Mae had a feeling that was just because Bea had beaten him to the punch. Angus and Germ, meanwhile, were both fairly quiet. Mae could tell it wasn’t out of fear, though—they were just being rational about the situation.

Well, Angus was. Germ was probably only quiet because he didn’t have anything to say. Mae had no idea if this situation was even unusual for Germ—maybe he went through this sort of thing every day.

“Okay, I get that y’all are pissed with me,” the tattoo man said. “I done wrong by you. Normally, I try not to do wrong by folks who haven’t done me wrong. But I need to know if the Hartley kid split town, okay? And I need to know if he’s got something of mine with him. That’s it.”

Mae hesitantly glanced over in Gregg’s direction. He was looking at Mae from over his shoulder, no-doubt thinking the same thing Mae was. They had to lie—there was no way they could tell the tattoo man the truth about what had happened to Casey. The truth would just sound too unbelievable to this guy. But if the tattoo man suspected they weren’t telling the truth, they could all wind up in serious trouble.

“Casey up and vanished while I was in college,” Mae said slowly. There—that wasn’t really a lie. “I honestly have no clue if he took anything with him when he left. He always used to talk about how he wanted to leave town, though.”

“Yeah, he didn’t tell anyone before he left!” Gregg added. His tone was anxious, and he was speaking a little too quickly. He made an effort to calm himself before continuing. “Casey probably hopped on a train to, like, Virginia or something.”

If the tattoo man noticed the anxiety in Gregg’s voice, he made no comment. Instead, he silently took his eyes off of Bea’s Mace for just a moment in order to turn his attention towards Mae.

Mae could tell that he was scrutinizing her—trying to tell if Mae was shitting him. Mae tried her best to not give off the faintest hint of bullshit. She just wanted this guy to get the answers he wanted and disappear from her life.

The tattoo man finally nodded, evidently satisfied with Mae’s answer. Mae felt as if a fifty-pound weight had been removed from her chest.

“Okay,” the tattoo man said thoughtfully. “I believe you. That’s not what I was hoping to hear, but I believe you. Except now we got a problem, yeah? ‘Cause it’s starting to look like Hartley stole from me and got away with it.”

Mae had a feeling that there were a lot of people who could say that about Casey. Casey’s fingers had never been quite as sticky as Mae’s, but he’d done a fair amount of shoplifting in his day. If Casey really had taken something from the tattoo man, though, it wasn’t likely he’d ever see his stuff again.

“Okay, great. Your question got answered,” Bea said angrily. “Now get the eff out of here.”

The tattoo man’s gaze flickered back to Bea’s canister of Mace. For some reason, he looked almost offended by it. It was as if Bea was somehow insulting him by trying to defend herself. Mae found herself worrying that the tattoo man might swat the Mace out of Bea’s hands and beat her up or something.

Thankfully, though, the tattoo man appeared to be willing to comply.

“Alright, I’m gone,” the tattoo man said. He turned and began walking back towards the Party Barn’s backdoor.

Bea didn’t lower her canister of Mace until he was a good distance away. When Bea’s arm returned to her side, Mae could see that the hand holding onto the Mace was shaking fiercely.

The tattoo man reached the Party Barn’s backdoor and stopped. He rested his hand on the metal doorframe, drumming his fingers along it thoughtfully. After a moment, he turned back towards Mae and her friends.

“One more thing,” the tattoo man said. He spoke to the whole room, but his eyes focused on Mae in particular.

“I dunno how involved any of you are in this, but take my advice and keep your noses clean. Your pal Casey and his buddies have effed up big time. They stole from me and my bosses. Now I’ve gotta figure out who to blame for this shit. And you don’t wanna be involved with whoever gets the blame. Got it?”

Mae frowned. The tattoo man’s warning was ominous as hell, but one particular thing he’d said stuck out to Mae.

“Buddies?” Mae asked. “What buddies?”

“Mae, don’t ask,” Angus whispered. “We shouldn’t get involved in this anymore than we already are.”

The tattoo man, having not heard Angus, raised a brow in surprise.

“What buddies?” He asked. “Levy and Steve, obviously. Those dummies. God.”

With that bomb dropped, the tattoo man made his exit.

 

* * *

 

  
“Okay, Mae, I think we should probably call the cops,” Bea said.

Mae shook her head. “No. This is more important,” she said, her mouth full of pizza.

Naturally, after a tense encounter with a shady-as-hell dude with a chip on his shoulder, the best place to head to was the local diner. The band hadn’t even bothered playing any music—all of them, Germ included, had just taken Mae up on her suggestion to go get something to eat. Music would have to wait for a day when the band wasn’t terrified out of their minds.

“He didn’t technically do anything illegal,” Gregg pointed out as he returned his uneaten crust to the tray. “I mean, he was kind of a dick, but that’s about it.”

“He was harassing Mae, Bug,” Angus said. He hadn’t so much as touched the pizza. That wasn’t odd, though—the Clik Clak’s pizza was pretty awful. “Even if he didn’t technically do anything, we can still tell the police about him.”

“Yeah,” Bea agreed. “As soon as I get home, I’m calling the cops. And then I’m gonna hope I can get to sleep tonight.”

Like Angus, Bea hadn’t had any of the pizza. Mae was willing to bet it wasn’t just because she didn’t like the taste, though. Bea had been anxiously looking off into the distance and bobbing her knee up and down the whole time they’d been at the diner.

Mae couldn’t really blame her. Staring down a big, sketchy dude while you were armed with only a can of Mace probably took a lot out of you.

Bea looked away from the spot in the distance she’d been staring off at and turned her eyes to Germ. “Hey, Germ?” Bea asked, concern in her voice. “You okay? You’ve been pretty quiet ever since that guy came into the Barn.”

Germ was focused entirely on the glass of soda that sat on the table in front of him. After a moment, Germ looked at Bea, removed his beak (lips?) from the glass’s straw, smacked his beak (again, lips?) and spoke.

“Nah,” Germ said. “It’s kinda hard to be scared of a guy named Dudley.”

Silence fell over the table. Germ had been about to return his attention to his soda when he realized that everyone was staring at him.

“You know that guy?” Bea asked, shocked.

“His name is Dudley?” Mae asked, equally shocked.

Germ just shrugged. “I mean, I don’t know him. But, like, Beth and Levy talk about him a lot. Levy’s in some sorta trouble with him, though. It sounds real serious.”

Mae had said it once before: she kept finding out new stuff about Germ. For such a little guy, he was full of surprises. Mae felt like she could know Germ for a hundred years and still get surprised by some of the stuff he said. From the looks on everyone else’s faces, Mae was willing to bet that they all felt the same way.

“Okay, slow down,” Mae said, despite the fact that Germ never spoke particularly fast. “You hang out with Levy?”

“I hang out with everyone,” Germ said. “You guys are just the only ones who ask me to.”

Germ noisily sucked up more soda through his straw while the band watched on. It took the 18-year-old a few moments to figure out that the gang wanted more information.

“So, like… Levy was selling stuff for Dudley. I think. But I guess a bunch of the stuff went missing around the time Casey disappeared? And Dudley’s real angry? Those are the details I got from Beth. I don’t like hanging around her—she makes me uncomfortable.”

At the mention of Levy selling stuff, everyone at the table reached the same conclusion. Even Mae, who sometimes had trouble putting two and two together, didn’t have to think too hard about this one. She could only think of one thing that Levy, local burnout and known weed aficionado, would be selling—drugs.

Wait. Were drugs one thing? Technically, they were a bunch of things, right? But they all sort of fell under the same umbrella? Kinda?

“Wait, wait,” Mae said. She was mostly talking to herself, trying to get her thoughts together. “What does any of that have to do with Casey? Why does this Dudley guy think Casey stole from him?”

Mae expected the others to be just as confused as her. Instead, though, when Mae looked around the table, she saw everyone except for Germ was exchanging awkward glasses. None of them looked like they knew what to say. Mae began to realize that she had yet to come to a conclusion that seemingly everyone else had reached.

“… What?” Mae asked defensively.

Nobody spoke right away. After a few more uncertain looks, Gregg was the first to respond.

“I mean… It probably has something to do with that lockbox of cash Casey wrote about,” Gregg pointed out. “You know, the one he got from his cousin? The cousin who had a trailer lab?”

Mae stared uncomprehendingly at Gregg.

“The trailer lab where he made drugs?” Gregg clarified.

Mae’s eyes widened in surprise. Gregg’s words felt like a slap in the face, and Mae needed a second to take them in.

“Whoa, whoa, hang on!” Mae said. “You actually believe that garbage? That’s just a bunch of bullshit that those weirdos in the mines made up! I mean, like…”

Mae balked, speechless. The fact that Gregg of all people was the one to bring this up was the most shocking part about all of this. Gregg had known Casey just as well as Mae. Gregg should have known that Casey wasn’t the sort of person to get involved in that sort of thing. Why would he suddenly start buying into that crap those old guys had said?

Angus cleared his throat awkwardly, drawing Mae’s attention.

“It wasn’t all bullshit,” he said tactfully. “Casey did have a cousin, and his cousin did have a trailer lab. And, given what Casey wrote down in his note, I’d say it’s fair to assume Casey was working with his cousin.”

“Okay, but, like…” Mae opened her mouth to respond, but all that came out was a confused stammer. Her eyes darted around the table. Everyone was staring at her expectantly. It was like being in school and having all your classmates stare at you when you get called on by the teacher to answer a question.

“Just because they worked in a trailer lab doesn’t mean they made drugs! Right?”

Nobody responded.

“… Right?” Mae asked, less certain.

Bea shook her head sadly. She had this pitying look on her face, like a child had just said the dumbest shit she’d ever heard.

“Mae, I’m not an expert on trailer labs, but I’m pretty sure that they’re only ever used for making drugs.” Bea stopped to take a sip of her iced tea. “Like, meth, specifically.”

Mae didn’t know what to say. For one thing, she’d assumed that people used trailer labs to grow weed. Mae didn’t know enough about drugs or chemistry to know how meth was made. She barely knew what meth was, actually. Was it the powedery stuff? Mae wasn’t sure.

On top of that, though, Mae hated that her friends were kind of making sense about this.

That didn’t mean Mae was having an easy time wrapping her head around all of this, though. Mae just couldn’t picture Casey Hartley, of all people, as a drug dealer. It just didn’t seem right. Casey hadn’t been a felon—he had just been a troublemaker, like Gregg and Mae. He’d done plenty of crimes, but that didn’t make him a criminal.

Right?

Mae looked down at the table and stared contemplatively at the leftover pizza slices. She had begun to lose her appetite. Before it went away completely, she tried to reach out and grab one of the remaining slices of pizza.

She wound up grabbing one of Gregg’s leftover crusts. Mae shrugged and ate it anyway.


	10. The Sass Factory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mae goes looking for answers. Steve and Levy have an important argument.

Mae had known that going up to the old abandoned Glass Factory where Steve Scriggins and his cronies hung out was a bad idea. But then again, Mae had never exactly been the queen of good decision-making.

When Mae woke up the day after her confrontation with the tattoo man (Or, as he was apparently known, ‘Dudley’) she hadn’t been able to get her mind over what she’d been told. Mae had had a lot of bombs dropped on her the other day, and she was still trying to get over the fallout.

She had a lot of questions—questions about Casey, and what he’d been doing during the two years Mae had been at college. None of Mae’s friends had any definite answers, though—just ideas and theories.

But that was okay. Even if Mae’s friends were about as clueless as she was, there were a few people in town who just might have the answers Mae needed. Unfortunately, those people were kind of horrible.

Mae had no way of actually knowing that Steve and Levy would be at the glass factory. It was the only place Mae could think to look, though. After all, Mae didn’t really associate with Scriggins, so she didn’t know what any of his hang-outs were. Mae assumed that Steve spent most of his time at garbage dumps with the rest of the trash people.

When Mae reached the glass factory, though, she soon discovered that she’d come to the right place. The old sedan with the faded, green paint that Mae had seen the last time she’d come to the factory was parked outside.

More evidence presented itself when Mae entered the factory. The old, busted down halls reeked of cigarette smoke. Mae’s nose and throat itched just from breathing in the air. The factory reeked of Scriggins.

It also reeked of Levy. Levy had a very distinctive smell, like weed and mothballs. It was probably that old hoodie he always wore.

Mae made her way down the halls of the glass factory, towards the old factory floor. Creaking pipes and wind through broken windows were the only noises Mae could hear at first. As she drew closer to the busted-down doors of the factory floor, though, Mae could make out a heated conversation in progress.

“That is such bullshit, Levy! You don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Mae stopped. That was Steve’s voice. He sounded angry, which was a little surprising. Mae didn’t know if she’d ever actually heard Steve being genuinely angry before. He was an asshole, sure, but he was a smug asshole—not an angry one. The tone of Steve’s voice was more than a little scary.

“Oh, that’s rich, coming from you! What, are you an expert now?!”

That was Levy’s voice. Mae had heard Levy’s anger plenty of times before. Unlike Steve, Levy wasn’t scary when he was angry—he was just kind of pathetic.

“I don’t need to be an expert to know bullshit when I hear it, asshole!”

“Oh yeah, smart guy? Oh yeah? Well, if I’m wrong, prove it. Tell me what I’ve got wrong, huh? Go on, Scriggins—tell me. Tell us. Go on.”

There was a pause in the argument. At first, Mae thought that they had stopped because they’d realized Mae was there. Steve and Levy couldn’t see Mae from where she stood by the doorway to the factory floor, but it was possible they could hear her. Or maybe they could smell her—Mae was aware that she kind of had a funk going on.

The conversation soon picked up again, though, and Mae realized she’d been worried for nothing. Steve had just been gathering his thoughts, apparently.

“Okay, so, they take the cream… And they, like, ferment it and shit. With bacteria.”

“Bacteria?!” Levy said incredulously. “That’s bullshit, dude! That’s such bullshit! They’re not gonna put effing bacteria in their food! Nobody would buy it if it was loaded up with germs and shit!”

“People use bacteria to make food all the time, asshole! How do you think they make yogurt?!”

“They leave the milk out in the sun until it gets all hard!” Levy screeched, livid.

“GOD DAMN IT, LEVY, YOU STUPID SON OF A BITCH!” Steve retrorted.

Mae stood there for a moment, confused. This conversation was interesting, but it wasn’t what she’d been expecting to hear. Levy and Steve’s argument wasn’t telling Mae anything about Casey or Dudley. Instead, it was just raising a lot of questions for Mae, who was realizing that she didn’t know nearly as much about dairy products as she pretended to.

The argument began to devolve into angry screaming. Mae couldn’t make out what was being said with Levy and Steve both yelling over each other. And anyway, Mae hadn’t come here just to listen to things—she’d come to say things, too. Mostly questions, but probably also a few classic burns regarding Steve and his Scrigginsness.

With the promise of classic burns in mind, Mae stepped into the glass factory’s main floor.

Levy and Steve were both standing by the machine Mae had seen them at last time. The hole in the factory wall that Steve had been pillaging copper from was bigger, and a few smaller holes had been knocked into the baseboard. The holes were momentarily unattended—Steve had evidently stopped his ‘side-job’ to argue with Levy.

As Mae stepped into view, Steve and Levy’s argument gradually died down. The two stopped talking and began glaring at Mar, their irritation plain on their faces. Normally, Mae felt anxious when people stared at her. When people like Steve and Levy were looking at her, though, Mae just felt kind of punchy.

“’Sup, assholes?” Mae asked. She turned her gaze over to one of the factory windows, where Beth Holstead was sitting in the windowsill. “Not you, Beth—you’re kinda cool.”

Beth, her eyes focused on her smartphone, wordlessly gave a thumbs-up in Mae’s direction. Mae nodded in acknowledgement. She was starting to get to like Beth, if only a little bit.

“The hell’re you doing here?” Steve asked irritably. He looked like he was still pretty worked up about his and Levy’s dairy-based argument. Mae didn’t really care enough to be tactful, though.

“I got questions, trash-boy,” Mae said. She tried her best to sound as stern and serious as Aunt Molly did whenever she interrogated Mae. It wasn’t working out too good—Aunt Mall Cop’s voice was way deeper than Mae’s. “Can we talk?”

Steve stared at Mae incredulously. Mae was used to that look; Steve used it a lot whenever Mae said something. It was like everything Mae said was baffling to Scriggins.

“What the goddamn hell makes you think we wanna talk to you?” Steve narrowed his eyes at Mae, as if trying to discern if she was serious or not. “We’re not friends, Borowski. You and me have never liked each other. Why would you come in here to talk to us?”

Steve pinched the bridge of his… nose? Snout? Whatever you call it, he pinched it. “Is this just a thing you do? Do you just walk up to random people and start talking to them? God, Borowski, what is your deal?”

Mae tightened her hands into fists. Levy and Steve were both staring at her, expecting some kind of response. Mae knew that lashing out at them and insulting them wouldn’t get Mae the answers she wanted. Unfortunately, she also couldn’t really help herself.

“Look, I just have some stuff I wanna ask you! Could you, like, not be an asshole for once in your life?”

Steve’s eyes widened, looking for the entire world like he was at a loss for words. A disbelieving scoff of a laugh escaped him.

“I’m the asshole?” Steve asked disbelievingly. “You can’t even go two sentences without insulting me, and I’m the asshole? The hell is your problem, Borowski? God!”

Now it was Mae’s turn to be baffled. “My problem? My problem? Why the hell wouldn’t I have a problem with you? Back in school, you were a huge bully! You’re, like, scum, and a criminal! You make everyone mis—”

“Stop.”

Steve’s voice carried a firm seriousness that Mae hadn’t been prepared for. Scriggins was glaring at Mae, dead-serious. He spat the cigarette he’d had in his lips down onto the factory floor and stomped it out.

“Stop. Okay?” Steve raised a finger and pointed accusingly at Mae. “You do not get to call me out on my shit, Borowski. You don’t get to act like you’re better than me when you pretty much do the exact same shit I do.”

Mae balked. What Steve was saying came from so far out of left field that it was crazy. For a moment, Mae didn’t know exactly what to say to that.

“I’m nothing like you,” Mae said sternly. “I was never a bully, or an asshole, or—”

Levy interrupted with a bitter laugh. “Oh my god, Borowski! Newsflash—pretty much everyone from school hated you because you were such a smartass to everyone! Like, you couldn’t go a whole day without saying something to make you look like a jackass!”

Huh?

Mae felt like she’d stepped into an alternate dimension. She looked behind her just in case she was being recorded for some jerkhole’s prank channel online. No assholes with smartphones were anywhere around, though. The only other person in the room was Beth, and she looked like she wasn’t even paying attention.

“Okay,” Mae said slowly, trying to get her thoughts in order. “Okay, fine. I say dumb shit. But I don’t do it, like, intentionally! It just happens!”

Steve sighed angrily. “No. Right. Of course. It just happens. Everything you do just happens. You just stumble through life like a giant baby, bumping your head against shit, and it’s not your fault ‘cause you don’t know any better. Oh my god.”

Mae stared uncomprehendingly at Steve. What was he getting at here?

“And you’ve got a lotta nerve calling me a criminal, Borowski,” Steve continued. “You and Gregg break shit and steal stuff for fun all the time. Do you think I’m doing this shit for fun? Do you think I’d be yanking shit out of the walls if I didn’t need the cash?”

“That’s… different,” Mae argued, uncertain if it really was.

“Oh, yeah,” Steve scoffed. “Yeah, it’s different. ‘Cause you and Gregg are so wacky, right? You’re not criminals. You just do crimes. Totally different.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “Y’know, I’m not friends with Gregg. But at least he doesn’t go around acting like he’s better than he is. At least I can have a conversation with him without him insulting me every ten seconds.”

“That’s just ‘cause Gregg’s too nice,” Mae pointed out. “If he wasn’t, he’d insult you all the time, just like everyone else.”

Steve stared blankly at Mae, as if she’d somehow just proven his point.

“Whatever,” Steve muttered. “God. Keep on acting like I’m the scum of the Earth, then. I don’t care.”

“You are the scum of the Earth,” Mae argued. She felt like she’d gotten off-track a little, but was too invested in this argument to change topic. “You used to make everyone miserable, Steve! You locked a teacher in a closet over Longest Night break and drove donuts around people in the parking lot!”

Steve’s glare turned a lot more hostile. He narrowed his eyes and folded his arms over his chest.

“Yeah?” Steve asked. “Well, I never put no one in the hospital.”

Silence. No words came out of Mae’s mouth when she tried to respond. She’d been struck silent by the low blow Steve had just dealt her. Mae spent a few seconds trying desperately to think of something clever and hurtful she could say back; something that would make him shut up. Finally, the words came to her.

“Eff you, Steve,” Mae said with a scowl.

“Yeah, yeah. Eff me. Whatever.” Steve began fishing around in his coat pockets and produced his packet of cigarettes. “Did you just come here to bitch, or what? Why are you even here?”

Mae blinked. Why was she here again? She’d kind of lost track of… well, everything. She must have had a reason to come and talk to Steve, right? God, what was it? It was on the tip of Mae’s tongue.

Oh. Right. The Casey thing.

“Hey, a guy named Dudley said you were friends with Casey,” Mae said, already forgetting what Steve had said to her. “What’s up with that?”

All at once, the mood in the factory floor changed. Steve, who had been pulling a cigarette out of its packet with his teeth, stopped and looked up at Mae. He was immediately suspicious, and looked more than a little shocked.

Levy, meanwhile, looked absolutely terrified. The dry contempt in his face had been replaced with the most fearful look Mae had ever seen on the burnout. His eyes darted from Mae to the door she’d come in from, as if he expected Dudley to come marching in after her. His whole body looked like it was shaking.

And then there was Beth. Beth was still on her phone. Beth didn’t give two shits about this conversation.

“… What else did Dudley say?” Steve asked cautiously. His anger towards Mae, momentarily forgotten, had given way to wariness. Mae couldn’t deny that she enjoyed seeing Steve without any of his smugness.

“He said you and Casey stole from him,” Mae said.

Steve considered this for a moment. He finished pulling his cigarette from its package and went to work lighting it. When he was done, he took a quick puff of smoke and stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets.

“Me and Levy didn’t steal nothing,” Steve said. “Your pal Casey is the one who stole the shit.”

Mae winced. She didn’t like hearing Steve of all people talking about Casey. She liked him accusing Casey of theft even less. Unfortunately, Mae couldn’t voice her displeasure if she wanted to get more information. She would have to play nice…

Or at least as nice as possible for Mae Borowski.

“… What did Casey steal?” Mae asked.

Silence. Levy had begun pacing back and forth, his arms hugged close to his body.

Steve narrowed his eyes at Borowski. For once, though, Mae could tell that he wasn’t glaring at her out of contempt. Steve had the look of a man who was being asked very personal information.

“That’s none of your business,” Steve growled.

Mae scoffed at that. “Yeah, well, this Dudley guy’s made it my business. The other day, he barged in on me and my friends at band practice so he could, like, interrogate us.”

Steve’s eyes widened in surprise. “Dudley’s been asking about this?!”

Beth looked up from her phone. “You guys are in a band?”

Mae nodded to both of the questions. “Yeah. Me, Gregg, Bea, and Angus get together to play music. Sometimes Germ shows up to watch us.”

Beth nodded slowly, as if finally understanding something. “Oh, right. I like that Germ kid. He’s cute, in, like, a virgin street urchin way.”

Mae didn’t know what to say to that. Instead, she looked back in Steve’s direction. Scriggins had pulled his cigarette from his lips. He was holding it in his left hand and staring downwards with a concerned expression on his face.

“Shit,” Steve muttered. “Shit, this is bad. Shit, shit, shit.”

Levy began talking to himself in a high-pitched, panicked whisper. “We’re dead. We’re so dead. We’re dead and we’re gonna have our bodies dumped in Mulvay.”

Okay, this was getting ridiculous. Mae threw her hands up in frustration.

“Will someone please explain to me what’s going on here?!”

Steve looked up and glared angrily at Mae. Apparently, he was pissed off about his brooding getting interrupted.

“Your friend effed us up the ass, Borowski—that’s what’s going on.” Steve placed his cigarette back between his lips. The tip glowed red for a moment before Steve continued.

“Him and Levy had a business arrangement, okay? Casey gets the product form his cousin, delivers it to Levy, and Levy sells it. The money gets split between all them, plus the people Dudley works for.”

Mae nodded slowly, trying to look like she was following all of this.

“But then shit goes downhill,” Steve continued. “Casey’s cousin died. His trailer caught fire—it was real nasty, apparently. So now there’s no new product. And Casey, I guess, is starting to get scared. So what’s Hartley do? He takes the product, takes the money, takes everything and splits town. And now Levy and me gotta deal with the mess.”

The factory floor fell quiet. Steve was huffing angrily on his cigarette. Levy was still pacing around. Beth had returned her focus to her phone.

Mae tried to put together what Steve had just said. ‘Product’ meant drugs, right? Mae knew that much. So, okay, Casey had been involved in drugs. That wasn’t great to hear. And as much as Mae wanted to say it wasn’t true, it was hard to imagine Steve was lying with how distressed he clearly was.

Had Casey really stolen a bunch of drug stuff? If he did, was that a bad thing? After all, he’d been stealing from criminals. Mae wasn’t really sure how to feel about that. Maybe it wasn’t a good or bad thing. Maybe it was just a thing.

But there was one thing Mae was certain about: Casey hadn’t taken the stuff and left town. Casey had never left town at all. The stuff was probably still in Possum Springs.

And if Steve and Levy were really in trouble, then wouldn’t telling them that be doing the right thing?

…

“Well, this was real interesting, but I gotta go,” Mae said. “I’ve gotta go do literally anything else.”

Steve shot an annoyed glare at Mae, but she was already turning around to leave. He muttered something under his breath, but Mae ignored him as she marched towards the doors of the factory floor. The smell of cigarette smoke was starting to get to her, and she wanted to get away from the Scriggins Gang as soon as possible.

What had the point of all that been? Mae guessed that her questions had been answered, but she was having trouble thinking about what she’d learned. Mostly, Mae was stuck on the stuff that Steve had said. And the stuff Levy had said.

Not so much the stuff Beth had said. She’d mostly just looked at her phone and compared Germ to a Victorian homeless child. Mae guessed that not everyone knew Germ had, like, an actual house. Even Gregg had apparently thought that Germ had lived in a tree.

Mae stopped. She’d made her way to the glass factory’s entrance when a thought occurred to her. It was like a bolt out of the blue—a sudden revelation that arose from seemingly unrelated thoughts.

But when Mae recalled what Gregg had said about Germ living in a tree, she remembered something.

Casey had had a treehouse, hadn’t he? It hadn’t been a very good treehouse; kind of just a bunch of shitty wood in the vague shape of a cube. It had sat in an ugly, misshapen tree that stood on the very edge of Casey’s backyard.

An ugly, misshapen, weird tree.

It was a bit of a leap, Mae was aware of that. But as her mind drifted back to the letter Casey had left for Gregg, she became more and more certain of one thing:

The lockbox was in Casey’s backyard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very sorry this took so long to come out. I've been a bit distracted lately.


	11. The Weird Tree

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After months of nonsense, Mae and the gang finally find Casey's hidden lockbox. Other things happen.

“Mae, this is trespassing,” Bea said. “We’re trespassing right now.”

Mae didn’t respond to that. She was too busy watching Gregg try climb over the chain-link fence that surrounded Casey’s backyard. She didn’t know why he wasn’t using the actual opening in the fence that she, Angus, and Bea had come through. Had Gregg forgotten about it? Was he just trying to impress Angus? It was a real mystery.

It was late. Or it was early, depending on how you looked at it. Either way, it was after midnight. No light was coming out of the windows of Casey’s former home. The light of the stars and the full moon barely illuminated the backyard, but Mae’s eyes had already adjusted to the dark. She could see fine, more or less.

“I don’t think Casey’s parents would press charges against us,” Angus pointed out. Like Mae, he was unable to look away from Gregg’s attempts to get over the fence. “And so long as we’re quiet, the neighbors probably won’t—”

“THE TOP! I REACHED THE TOP!” Gregg cried out excitedly. He was lying on top of the chain link fence, basically straddling it with his entire body. “CAP’N! SOMEONE! PULL ME OVER!”

Angus frowned, nonplussed. “Hmm.”

Quickly and quietly, Angus walked up to the fence. Gregg was wildly shaking his hand for the big guy to grab onto, which he did when he was close enough. With a bit of a grunt, Angus pulled Gregg over and into Casey’s backyard. Gregg thanked his boyfriend with a big hug, which Angus stoically returned.

Bea sighed and folded her arms over her chest. She waited for Gregg and Angus to finish hugging before she continued criticizing Mae’s great plan.

“Okay, but even if they don’t press charges, we’re still in someone’s backyard, looking to dig up a locker full of drug money.”

Bea paused, a thought occurring to her.

“God, I can’t believe this is my life,” she sighed.

Mae turned to look at the backyard. It was pretty much exactly how she remembered it from when she’d hung out with Casey back in the day. It was still overgrown with weeds, and there was still an old, broken down grill sitting randomly in the middle of the yard. The grill had always been like that, even before Casey’s bio-dad died. Mae didn’t know if it had ever been not busted. Mae didn’t even know if the grill belonged to Casey’s family.

Mae’s attention eventually turned to the ugly, dead tree at the end of the backyard. Its branches stuck out over the chain-link fence, poking into the woods behind Casey’s home. Nestled in the tree’s branches was the world’s shittiest treehouse; a big board of plywood with four smaller board serving as walls.

That treehouse, Mae thought, was the only really selfless thing Casey’s bio-dad had ever done for his son. And he’d still done a really shitty job.

It was kind of amazing that the treehouse hadn’t fallen apart by now, honestly. Possum Springs had some pretty terrible weather, after all. Mae didn’t know how the treehouse hadn’t been blown off of the tree or drowned in a super-flood. Maybe Casey’s bio-dad had actually been some sort of wizard architect.

But now wasn’t the time for treehouse mysteries. Now was the time for digging.

“Okay,” Mae said, trying to keep her voice to a whisper. “Let’s try and figure out where Casey might’ve buried the lockbox. This might take a while.”

Mae looked all around the backyard a few times, doing a quick survey of it from where she stood. Everyone else, meanwhile, had their eyes focused on one particular spot on the ground. It took Mae a moment to realize they were all staring at something.

“Yeah,” Bea said. “I mean, it’s not like he could’ve buried it under that patch of dirt with the shovel on top of it.”

Mae blinked. At the base of the weird tree was a patch of dirt, looking like a brown island among the ocean of dying grass. A shovel had been carelessly discarded on the patch of earth, its blade partially covered with dirt. From the looks of things, it had been there for a while.

Mae stared at the spot that had clearly been dug up some time in the past.

“Okay, we don’t know it’s there,” Mae said quickly.

“I think I can see the lid,” Gregg said, pointing at the dirt. “He didn’t even do a good job burying it.”

Bea scoffed. “So all this time you’ve been agonizing over where Casey might have buried his shit, and you could’ve figured it out just by looking in his backyard?”

“Yeah, this wasn’t really much of a mystery in hindsight,” Angus muttered.

Mae kept staring at the shovel, and the dirt, and the corner of metal poking out of the ground. Casey, it turned out, had been terrible at burying things. He never would’ve made it as a pirate, despite owning a boat and enjoying booty.

At least he’d left the shovel out in the open. Mae hadn’t actually gotten around to buying and/or borrowing a shovel from Bea.

“So who’s gonna dig it up?” Gregg asked. He held Angus’s hand as they moved to stand beside Mae.

“I can do it,” Mae said. “It’s not that deep. Plus, I’m good at digging.”

“Yeah you are, dude!” Gregg praised enthusiastically.

As it turned out, Mae didn’t need to put her superior digging skills to use. All Mae needed to do was brush the layer of dirt that covered the lockbox’s lid. Mae dug her fingers into the dirt that surrounded the box and began pulling it out. The metal box wasn’t terribly heavy, and soon Mae was lifting it into the air and setting it down on the grass.

The lockbox was made of metal, and was colored military-green. It had probably originally belonged to Casey’s bio-dad. Another piece of junk he couldn’t be bothered to give to Casey back when he was alive.

“Okay, you’ve got the box,” Bea whispered. “Now can we please get out of here? One of the neighbors might see us.”

“It’s after midnight, Beebee,” Mae whispered back. “Who looks into their neighbor’s backyards after midnight?”

“Some people do,” Angus pointed out. “But, uh… they’re usually weirdos.”

“I just wanna take a quick look,” Mae said quietly. “We can leave as soon as I…”

Mae’s voice trailed off as she struggled to open up the lockbox. The box rattled softly, the handle on its side tapping against its metal surface. No matter how hard Mae pushed or pulled, though, the lid didn’t so much as budge.

It was then that Mae noticed the brass keyhole on the front of the box.

For a moment, the only sound in the night was the chirping of crickets. Mae stared uncomprehendingly at the keyhole. She tried to somehow convince herself that this was a hallucination. But no; the keyhole stayed, no matter how hard Mae tried to dissociate it away.

Locked. It was locked. Why was Casey’s lockbox locked?

Oh. Right. It was a lockbox. It had been kind of dumb of Mae to assume that it wouldn’t have a lock.

Reality began to catch up to Mae. She took in a breath and eloquently expressed her frustration in the most restrained way she could think of:

“BALLS!”

“Mae!” Bea hissed, sensibly upset at Mae’s lack of volume control.

“It’s effing locked!” Mae said, trying (and failing) to keep her anger to a whisper. “Why’d Casey lock it?! Isn’t burying it enough?!”

“Mae, calm down,” Angus said, concern in his voice.

“Yeah, dude,” Gregg said. “I can pick the lock open back at the apartment. It’s no big deal.”

Mae’s face fell a little. In her frustration, she’d forgotten all about Gregg’s sick lock-picking skills. If Gregg could pick the locks on elevators in the dark, he’d have no problem picking the lock on a thirty-something-year-old hunk of junk like this. She’d let the stress of the last few days get to her.

“Yeah,” Mae said. “Yeah, okay. Let’s get back to Gregg’s apartment.”

“Mae, it’s after midnight,” Bea said. “We should all go home and you can open this up tomorrow.”

Mae, who had returned to trying to pry the lockbox open with her bare hands, looked up at Bea in surprise.

“Huh? Why?”

“Because we have jobs,” Bea whispered impatiently. “We all have jobs. Why is that so hard for you to remember?”

“Because it’s dumb and boring,” Mae said. “I’ll start paying attention when you all get cooler jobs.”

Bea closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. Mae knew what that mean. Bea was about to mutter something under her breath; something like ‘Oh my God’, or ‘For eff’s sake’. It was an experience Mae had become very familiar with ever since returning to Possum Springs.

Before Bea could actually say something, though, another voice cut in through the quiet of the night.

“What the hell are you guys doing in Hartley’s backyard?” Levy asked.

Mae felt her whole body go tense.

Levy and Steve were standing on the opposite side of the fence that Gregg had only just climbed over. The two of them were staring at Mae and the gang with a mix or irritation and confusion. The faint glow of Steve’s cigarette just barely illuminated his and Levy’s faces in the night.

Looking over her shoulder at them, Mae had to guess that they hadn’t seen the lockbox yet. Mae dropped the lockbox to the ground and hunched over, trying to hide it with her body. To Steve and Levy, it would just look like Mae was pointing her butt at them. For some reason.

“What are… you guys doing here?” Mae asked, trying to turn the conversation around.

Levy lifted up his hand and pointed a thumb at the shabby, one-story house behind him and Steve.

“I live next door,” Levy said. “You seriously didn’t know that?”

Oh, for crying out loud. Why did Possum Springs have to be such a small town? Why the hell did everyone have to be in walking distance of each other?

“Well… what’s Steve doing here?”

“Your mom,” Steve retorted smugly. The light of his cigarette bobbed up and down as he chuckled to himself.

Mae hated herself for falling for that one again. It was such a dumb, immature joke, but Steve still kept getting her with it. She really needed to stop interacting with this guy. The sooner, the better.

Mae stood and turned slowly, trying to keep the lockbox behind her. Thankfully, it was either too dark for Levy and Steve to see, or they weren’t paying much attention to Mae. Both options were equally likely, now that Mae thought about it.

“So you guys just creep around in people’s backyards now?” Steve asked, chuckling. His expression changed to one of amusement to one of confusion, however, as he recognized just who was in the backyard.

“Wait a minute… Delaney? Is that you?” Steve narrowed his eyes. “And, uh… The hardware chick? The hell’re you doing here? You two are all responsible and shit.”

“If you call me ‘the hardware chick’ again, I’m going to deck you,” Bea snapped. Mae resisted the urge to run over and high-five her.

Surprisingly, Steve actually looked a little taken aback by Bea’s response. He held up his hands defensively. While he still had his usual shit-eating grin on his face, his eyes looked almost genuinely apologetic almost.

“Hey, sorry,” he said. “Just don’t know your name is all. But why’re you and Delaney in Hartley’s backyard?”

Bea didn’t say anything. She wordlessly looked out of the corner of her eye in Mae’s direction. It looked like Bea didn’t know what to say. Judging by the way Angus was fidgeting, Mae guessed he was in the same boat. That meant it was up to either Mae or Gregg to come up with a plausible lie.

“Well,” Mae began, “we were hunting for ghosts—”

“They’re digging up Casey’s lockbox,” Germ said.

Nobody had seen or heard Germ arrived. But all of a sudden, there he was, standing in Casey’s backyard, behind Mae and the gang. To say everyone was shocked was a bit of an understatement. Many shouts of surprise were made, and many cusses were sworn. Thankfully, the noise didn’t appear to have awakened anyone in Casey’s home.

“Effing hell, Warton!” Levy snapped, trying his best to keep his voice low. “You can’t sneak up on dudes like that!”

“Yeah,” Germ said. It wasn’t clear if he was agreeing with Steve or merely acknowledging him. A lot of things Germ said weren’t all that clear.

“Wait,” Steve held up a hand. “Hold up. What’d you just say about a lockbox, Germ?”

Oh effing hell. With a scowl, Mae tried to push the lockbox further behind her with her boot. Mostly, she just wound up kicking its side a little. The sound of her boot banging against the metal wound up doing the opposite of what Mae had intended.

“… The hell’re you kicking, Borowski?” Scriggins asked suspiciously.

Mae swallowed nervously. She could feel everyone’s eyes on her. Instead of trying to come up with a lie or excuse, Mae just said the first thing that came to her mind.

“… Eff off, Scriggins.”

“Just tell him what it is, Mae,” Bea insisted. “We shouldn’t be messing with this shit anyway. That’s drug money.”

“Oh my god!” Mae yelled. “Can none of you keep quiet about this?!”

Mae looked at Gregg for solidarity. Her oldest friend nodded in agreement. It was such a shame that people couldn’t keep a lockbox full of money a secret these days. What was the world even coming to?

“Hang on.” In one swift movement, Steve pulled himself up and over the fence that separated Casey and Levy’s yards. Mae hated how impressive that had been. Did Steve do parkour or something?

“You’re telling me that the shit Casey stole from Levy has been back here the whole time?” Steve asked as he began approaching Mae. “Fork it over, Borowski.”

Steve reached out to pull the lockbox from behind Mae. Reacting quickly, Mae turned, grabbed the lockbox, and ran to the other end of the yard. Scriggins didn’t pursue her—he looked a little shocked by her actions. His surprise turned to anger before too long, though.

“What the hell, Borowski?! That’s Levy’s stuff!”

“I mean, technically it’s Casey’s cousin’s stuff,” Levy said from behind the fence. “But also, it should be Dudley’s stuff.”

Steve turned and glared in Levy’s direction.

“Shut the eff up, Levy. I’m trying to save your ass.”

“No way!” Mae hugged the lockbox tighter to her chest. “This is ours! Casey left it for us!”

Scriggins’s eyes widened in confused outrage. He pulled the cigarette from his mouth and glared angrily at Mae.

“This isn’t a game, Borowski!” Steve hissed. “Levy’s ass is on the line here. He’s gonna be in serious trouble if we don’t get that shit back to Dudley!”

Mae didn’t say anything. She felt like a giant pair of pliers were squeezing her head. Casey had left this money for Mae and Gregg. But it was drug money, right? And Steve and Levy, as shitty as they were, would get into trouble if they didn’t have this money. They might get hurt, or killed, and as much as Mae hated them, she didn’t know if she could have that on her conscience.

Damn it. Mae wanted to keep the lockbox, she really did. It had been something Casey had left behind for them.

But was it worth letting these guys get killed over?

“It’s locked,” Mae said as she dropped the lockbox to the ground. “We were gonna have Gregg unlock it.”

Steve actually looked surprised when he saw Mae drop the lockbox. He stuck the cigarette back in his mouth and walked to where Mae stood. As he bent down to pick up the lockbox, Mae almost thought that she heard him say something like ‘Thanks’ under his breath.

“Don’t need any fancy lock-picking for this,” Steve said as he slid his fingers under the hem of the lid. He pulled straneously, trying to force the lockbox open. “Just… gotta… use some muscle…!”

“I already tried that,” Mae said solemnly.

Steve scoffed. “With those arms? That ain’t trying very hard.”

“Steve, I’m saving you and your friend’s lives,” Mae said. “Don’t sass me.”

The only noise Steve made in response was a grunt as he continued fussing with the lockbox. He was so wholeheartedly focused on the stupid thing that it looked like he hadn’t registered what Mae had said. He just stood there, holding the lockbox under his armpit while his fingers tried to pry it open.

It was really stupid, but it also made Mae really sad.

This whole treasure hunt had been for nothing. All it had done was make Mae realize that she and her friends hadn’t known Casey as well as they’d thought. And they’d never get a chance to know him any better.

And stupid Steve didn’t even know Casey was dead. He was too busy gritting his teeth, trying to force the lockbox open. Mae really hated all of this. She didn’t know how it could get worse.

“God! Damn! It!” Steve yelled as he violently tugged on the lid of the lockbox. “These things are usually shit! Why’s this one so hard to open?!”

“Maybe you need to let a real man open it,” an unpleasantly familiar voice said.

Steve and Mae both froze. A large figure in a heavy coat was standing on the other side of the fence, creeping up on Levy. There was something long in the figure’s hand as he stomped closer in their direction. And while Mae couldn’t see the figure’s face, she didn’t need to in order to know that he had a tribal tattoo on it.

“Oh, shit!” Gregg yelled. “It’s Duncan!”

“Dudley,” several voices corrected all at once.

“What the eff are all of you kids doing here?” Dudley asked irritably.

“Us?!” Mae scoffed. “What are you doing here?! You said you weren’t going to stalk me anymore!”

“I wasn’t stalking you!” Dudley said, sounding genuinely offended. “I was stalking Levy! I was gonna hit him with this crowbar!”

Dudley lifted the long object he held in his hand and waved it above Levy’s head. Levy turned around, saw this, and collapsed onto the ground, whimpering.

“Then I heard you assholes talking about some lockbox that had my shit in it,” Dudley said, lowering the crowbar to his side. “So Hartley wasn’t even smart enough to take it with him when he ran off, huh?”

“It’s a lot more complicated than that,” Mae sighed. She was getting too tired to keep up the pretense that Casey was still alive.

“Also, I’m not an asshole,” Germ said matter-of-factly.

“Who said that?” Dudley asked, struggling to see in the dark. “Was that Warton? Jeremy Warton? Of course you’re not an asshole. I’d never call you an asshole.”

Mae blinked. “Wait, you know Germ?”

“Everyone knows Germ,” Dudley said irritably.

Mae looked over her shoulder at Germ, who just nodded matter-of-factly. Somehow, Mae wasn’t surprised by this. Maybe she was just running out of energy to be surprised by Germ’s weirdness. It was pretty late, after all.

“Look, we can forget about all that for now,” Dudley said. “I’m willing to let Levy’s eff-up slide if my shit’s really in that box. I just wanna get this over with so I can get outta this shithole.”

As Dudley bent down to crawl through the opening in the fence, Steve dropped the lockbox to the ground. He backed away from it, as if he wanted to distance himself from all of this. Mae didn’t know how involved Steve was in all of this drug stuff, but it was clear that he wanted to wash his hands of it.

When Dudley had finished crawling into Casey’s backyard, he stood and looked around him. After a second, he walked towards the lockbox, glaring intently at it. He came to a stop right above it and knelt down to take a closer look.

“The key to something like this,” he said, “is that you gotta use finesse.”

Dudley lifted the crowbar up into the air and swung it down hard on the lid of the lockbox. He kept swinging it over and over like it was a baseball bat, hitting the lockbox with enough force to make it dent. The air was filled with the loud sound of metal against metal.

“What the hell!” Steve whispered under the din. “What are you doing?!”

“OPEN UP, YOU PIECE OF SHIT BOX!” Dudley screamed as he smashed the crowbar into the lid. “YOU HEAR ME KNOCKING, ASSHOLE?! OPEN UP!”

Holy shit! Mae kind of loved Dudley now. If there was anything that could change her opinion on someone, it was them wailing on an inanimate object with a blunt instrument. She wanted to start cheering him on, but he was already making a lot of noise. There was no need to add to it.

“Would you quiet down, you maniac?!” Bea whispered. “We’re trespassing!”

“I don’t give a shit!” Dudley yelled. “I want my shit! Gimme my shit, stupid box!”

The stupid box had been crumpled liked a soda can under the force of Dudley’s swings. Mae had to imagine Dudley was either really strong or the crowbar he was using was really heavy. In any case, as Mae stared at the box, she saw that the lid was beginning to bounce under the force of Dudley’s swings.

“Whoa, whoa!” Mae said. “Hold up!”

Dudley, to Mae’s surprise, actually stopped beating on the poor box. Mae took the opportunity to rush forward and grab the lockbox.

“The hell are you doing?” Dudley asked warningly.

“Relax, dude. I’m just opening it.” Mae felt like she at least had to do that. Even if she wasn’t going to be able to keep the contents of the box, she wanted to see what Casey had left. She wanted to see the money Casey had left for his friends in the event of his untimely demise.

Mae tested the lid with her thumbs. Sure enough, the lock had been broken. With a bit of effort, Mae was able to push the lid off. The lid popped off of one of its hinges and fell back at an angle. Mae looked down into the crushed, metallic contents of the box. Her eyes widened in shock as she slowly became aware of just what she was seeing.

“Well?” Dudley asked. “Is my shit in there?”

“How much money did Casey leave?” Gregg asked eagerly. “A hundred? Five hundred? A million?!”

Mae blinked once. Then twice. Slowly, she looked up from the box and looked at everyone gathered around her. After a moment, Mae gave the answer to the question on everyone’s mind.

Finally, the contents of the box that everyone had been curious about were revealed.

“There’s, like, fifteen dollars in here,” Mae said, stunned.

Everyone stared at Mae in shock. Dudley, stumbling, walked over to Mae and checked the contents of the box for himself. When he saw the ten dollar bill and the five ones in the box, he dropped his crowbar onto the grass in silent disbelief.

Nobody knew what to say. The night was heavy with silence.

Well, it was heavy with silence for a few seconds. Because it wasn’t long after that that everyone heard the police sirens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, sorry for the slip in regularly posting chapters. Have been distracted, and have started a new job. Rest assured, though, I'm still working on this fic!


	12. The Police

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mae experiences an awkward conversation, an awkward car ride, and an awkward life in general.

Shit.

That was the only word that came to Mae’s mind as the sounds of approaching police sirens filled the night air. Everything around her—her friends, Steve and Levy, Dudley, even the backyard they were standing in—seemed to drift away It was an unpleasantly familiar feeling, and Mae had to struggle to hold onto anything. As she did so, several questions occurred to her.

Unfortunately, since she could only think of one word, the answers to those questions were all the same.

What should she do? Shit. How far were the police? Shit. Did they have time to run? Shit, shit, shit.

“Shit,” Mae whispered.

There was no time to think. Before Mae even knew what she was doing, she had grabbed onto Bea’s shoulders. Bea gave a grunt of surprise as Mae started shoving her friend in the direction of the fence’s opening, but Mae said nothing in reply. She needed to get her friends out of here.

Bea, Angus and Gregg couldn’t be here when the cops came. Mae didn’t care if she got caught, but her friends couldn’t afford the kind of trouble the police brought. Bea would wind up having more money problems. Gregg and Angus wouldn’t be able to move to Bright Harbor. Germ would…

Actually, Mae didn’t know if Germ had any real problems in his life. He seemed to have things relatively together.

“Mae, what the eff!” Bea protested.

“Shut out and get up!” Mae ordered. She gave Bea one final push in the fence’s direction and stepped back. With this, Beatrice appeared to get the message. She began crawling through the opening in the fence.

Mae turned around to call for Gregg and Angus, but they were already running to the opening in the fence. Once Bea crawled through to the other side, Angus began to follow after her. As Gregg crawled through after his boyfriend, Mae ran over to where she’d dropped the lockbox.

The police sirens were only getting louder. Mae knew she didn’t have time to go back for the box. All the same, she couldn’t just leave Casey’s lockbox behind, no matter how lame its contents had turned out to be.

When Mae kneeled down to pick up the lockbox, though, she caught a glimpse of Dudley out of the corner of her eye. The tattooed drug dealer was staring at her, expressionless. For a moment, Mae thought he was going to try and grab the lockbox from her. Evidently, though, fifteen dollars wasn’t a very tempting prospect, and Dudley was soon running off to jump the back fence and run into the woods.

“Mae!” Bea hissed, her attempt at a whisper drowned out by the approaching police car. “Just leave it! Come on!”

Mae ignored her best friend’s sensible advice. She stood up and took one last look at the backyard. She was alone in it now; Steve had jumped back over to Levy’s side of the fence, and Germ had simply disappeared. Mae tried to swallow the strange loneliness that the backyard inspired in her. Then, clutching the lockbox to her chest, Mae sprinted towards the opening in the fence where her friends were still waiting for her.

She only made it about halfway to the fence before a cop shined their flashlight into the backyard, directly into Mae’s face. Mae gradually and reluctantly came to a stop, a groan of frustrated defeat escaping her. She raised her hand to try and shield her eyes from the harsh light of the cop’s flashlight and waited for the inevitable.

“Oh, for God’s sake, Mae,” Aunt Molly said.

Of course. Out of the two or three cops in town, the one who showed up just had to be the one who’d give her the hardest time. Mae squinted her eyes and held up a hand to unenthusiastically wave at the responding officer.

“Hi, Aunt Molly,” Mae said.

Aunt Molly sighed before moving her flashlight around the backyard. It didn’t take her long to point the beam of light at the part of the fence Mae’s friends had all run through. Bea, Gregg, and Angus, either unable or unwilling to leave Mae alone, were still standing on the other side of the fence. Levy and Steve were nowhere to be seen.

Mae silently cursed her friends for not just running off like the others had done. Then she cursed herself for dragging her friends into this. They all looked mortified in the cold light of Aunt Mall Cop’s flashlight, and it made Mae wish she’d never insisted on them coming along on her stupid treasure hunt.

“Santello?” Aunt Molly asked, surprised at the faces she was seeing. “Delaney? What are you all doing here? Mae, what’s going on?”

“Officer?”

The familiar voice of Casey’s stepdad came from the front yard. Mae saw as the stepdad (What was his name? Doug?) came from the front of the house and joined Aunt Molly. He was wearing a bathrobe and slippers, and had a serious case of bedhead. When he saw Mae in his backyard, a bewildered mix of surprise and disbelief appeared on his face.

“Oh, Mae!” Doug said, laughing. “Is that you? God, I thought it was a burglar! What are you doing back there?”

“She’s trespassing, for one thing,” Aunt Molly muttered, her tone deadpan.

Doug’s smile disappeared. He blinked and looked from Mae to Molly to Mae again.

“Officer, I’m sure that Mae and her friends have a reason to be here,” he said unconvincingly. “I mean, we don’t need to… Make a big deal out of this, do we?”

“That depends,” Molly said with a sigh. “It’s your property. They’re only trespassing if you say they are.”

In the harsh light given off by Molly’s flashlight, Mae could see that Doug was uncertain. Given the situation, Mae couldn’t blame him. In Doug’s eyes, Mae and her friends had been acting like noisy jackasses in his backyard. If they had been complete strangers, or if he’d known about the shady drug dealers who had been with them, Doug might have decided to press charges.

But Mae was relieved to see Doug begin shaking his head, a dismissive frown on his face.

“No, it’s fine,” he said. “I’m sure they had a reason to be here. Probably just wanted something from Casey’s room.”

“… Right,” Molly said, clearly not too satisfied with that answer. She looked over the fence at Mae and gave her a very tired look. It was a look that Mae was very used to seeing on Aunt Mall Cop’s face.

Eventually, though, Aunt Molly’s eyes drifted down to the lockbox Mae was holding in her arms.

“What’s in the box, Mae?” Molly asked, her eyes narrowing in suspicion.

Mae didn’t say anything right away. As a cop, Aunt Molly probably knew at least a little about Casey’s business with his cousin. On top of that, the fact they were right next door to the home of Levy, local burnout and amateur dealer, probably only made Molly even more suspicious.

Thankfully, though, Doug once again came to the rescue. Apparently mistaking Mae’s panicked silence for embarrassment, he quickly spoke up.

“Oh, that’s something of Casey’s,” Doug said, trying to keep his voice low. “He uses those to keep his, er… his magazines in.”

“… His magazines?” Molly repeated, clearly not following.

Doug cleared his throat awkwardly.

“His, you know… His magazines.”

Molly blinked tiredly. She sighed and closed her eyes, clearly uninterested in trying to decipher whatever the hell Doug was talking about. Mae suspected that Molly wasn’t too happy with getting called out to this neighborhood over nothing. Much like Mae, Molly probably just wanted to get this night over.

“Okay,” Molly said wearily. “If no one’s pressing any charges, I think everyone should go home for tonight. We can get this all sorted out later.”

For the first time since Aunt Mall Cop shined her flashlight onto Mae and her friends, Bea spoke up.

“I can drive us all home,” Bea said. She sounded relieved, as well as a little embarrassed. Mae had to guess Bea wasn’t going to be very happy with her. Mae wasn’t very happy with herself, either.

“Thank you, Bea,” Molly sighed. With a click, she switched off her flashlight. The dark of night quickly returned to the backyard, reducing everyone to dim silhouettes. Mae blinked away the remaining discomfort in her eyes, grateful to be out of the light.

“Agh,” Mae grumbled. She raised her hand to wave at both Doug and Aunt Mall Cop, shifting the weight of the lockbox in her other arm. “Okay, well, it’s nice to see you, Aunt Molly. We’re gonna—”

“No,” Aunt Molly said firmly. “Mae, you’re coming with me.”

Mae, who had already begun walking towards the opening in the backyard’s fence, stopped. She glanced over at her friends. Gregg and Angus both looked very sympathetic. Bea, however, just looked very tired—not at all sorry for her friend.

“… But I’m not under arrest!” Mae exclaimed.

“Doesn’t matter,” Aunt Molly retorted. “Get in my squad car. I’m driving you home.”

Mae didn’t say anything. Weren’t there, like, rules against cops just randomly ordering people to get into their cop cars? Mae was pretty sure she’d seen a video about this online. Some dorky upper-middle class dude had made a video about what to do if a cop pulled you over. He hadn’t said anything about what to do if that cop was your aunt, though.

With a sinking feeling, Mae realized that she really didn’t have a choice here. Once again, online tutorials had failed to save her.

“Fine,” Mae grumbled reluctantly. Keeping the lockbox to her chest, Mae began trudging to join her aunt.

“Good night, Mae!” Gregg called after her.

Mae wasn’t sure how to respond to that. After the night they’d all had, ‘Good night’ was such a completely normal thing to say that it was almost bizarre. Instead of speaking, Mae just raised a hand and waved Gregg goodbye.

She had a feeling she was in for a very long car ride.

 

* * *

 

The backseat of Officer Molly’s squad car was one of Mae’s least favorite places to be in the world. It certainly hadn’t gotten any better since the last time Mae had sat in it, which wasn’t that long ago. The uncomfortable leather seats and partition between the front and back of the car actually seemed to have become even more cold and unfriendly since then.

In the glow of the car’s headlights, Mae watched as Molly went around to the car’s driver’s side and opened the door. She hefted herself into the seat and closed the door behind her. Much to Mae’s displeasure, Molly didn’t turn the key in the car’s ignition. She allowed the car to sit there while her eyes moved to stare at her niece in the car’s rearview mirror.

“Do you have any idea how lucky you are?” Molly asked, a scolding tone to her voice.

Mae didn’t know how to answer that. She didn’t feel like she had any sort of luck whatsoever. Stuff always went wrong, and sometimes it went really wrong. Sometimes Mae got shot by cultists, or wound up involved in some weird drug thing.

Really, Mae was too tired to consider herself lucky.

“No,” Mae muttered. “But I’m sure you’ll tell me.”

Molly narrowed her eyes and glared at Mae.

“I’m serious, Mae,” Molly said. “If anyone else had called the police about all of the noise you were making, you and your friends would be in a cell right now. Do you understand that?”

Mae said nothing. She kept the lockbox in her lap and glanced away from her aunt’s gaze.

With an air of defeat, Molly started up the car and began pulling away from the curb. The headlights bathed the roads of Possum Springs in cold, white light. There was something eerie about bright lights at night that Mae couldn’t quite put her finger on. Maybe she was just too tired to really think about it.

After a while, Molly just sighed again and shook her head.

“I don’t know why I’m even trying to lecture you on this,” she said irritably. “It’s not like you ever listen to me. Honestly, Mae, I don’t know what it takes to get through to you.”

“Eldritch horrors,” Mae grumbled sleepily. “And nearly dying in a mine.”

Evidently, Molly didn’t hear what Mae said, as she didn’t comment on it. Instead, as she drove them around a corner in the street, Molly returned to glaring at Mae through the rearview mirror.

“You don’t think about the consequences of anything you do,” Molly chastised. “You know consequences exist, but you don’t really understand them. Things aren’t always going to work out for you, Mae.”

Mae closed her eyes but said nothing. She didn’t want to argue with her aunt about all of this. Mae already felt bad enough about nearly getting all of her friends thrown in jail. Getting dragged into a shouting match with Aunt Mall Cop would only make Mae feel even worse.

Mae opened her eyes and glanced uninterestedly out the window of her aunt’s patrol car. It was too dark to see anything in Possum Springs. Lights occasionally shined from streetlights or windows, looking like hanging phantoms in the air.

At the speed they were going, though, the lights all just looked like shapes to Mae.

“You know where the Hartley kid is, don’t you?”

Aunt Molly’s question came so suddenly that Mae almost thought she’d imagined it. But when Mae looked towards the front of the car, she saw her aunt was still looking at her through the rearview mirror. Her eyes were focused intently on Mae as they neared the street Mae lived on.

Mae needed a moment to process what she was being asked. Why was Aunt Mall Cop asking about Casey? What did she suspect, and why did she suspect it? Had Mae done or said something to give herself away?

Or did Aunt Molly know where Casey was too?

For the first time in several months, Mae found herself wondering if her aunt had been involved in the conservative death cult that had operated in Possum Springs. Mae couldn’t help it; the suspicion had been in the back of her mind ever since learning about the cult’s existence. Her aunt had tried awfully hard to convince Mae that the ‘ghost’ hadn’t been anything, after all.

The fact that Aunt Molly was still alive probably should have lessened those fears. But just because Molly hadn’t been with the cult when the mine collapsed didn’t mean she wasn’t involved. Maybe she hadn’t gone out to the mine that night. Maybe her cultist uniform needed to be dry-cleaned. Who could say?

Mae soon sensed that her aunt was waiting for an answer. Playing it safe, Mae said the first thing that came to mind.

“He’s probably somewhere up north,” Mae said quietly. “Casey always talked about going there.”

Molly made a noise. It was sort of like a grunt, but with more vowels. It was the sort of sound that said ‘Mae, I know you’re bullshitting me. My sister has created a lie-child.’

“What?” Mae asked defensively. “That’s all I know! Casey didn’t, like, email me or anything. Apparently, he just up and left.”

It made Mae sick to lie about what had happened to Casey. Lying to a cop, particularly her aunt, made her feel a little bit better, though. Unfortunately, the fact that Aunt Molly clearly didn’t believe what Mae was saying only served to make Mae feel sick all over again.

“You know it’s illegal to lie to a cop, right?” Molly asked.

Mae frowned. “Is it?”

“Yup.” Aunt Molly returned her eyes to the road and nodded. They were nearing Mae’s house now.

“Oh.” Mae shrugged. “No, I didn’t know that.”

“I somehow doubt it makes a difference either way.” Molly began to pull up to the curb of the street Mae’s house sat on. Mae looked out the window at her home and saw warm light from the living room window. Dad was probably watching Garbo and Malloy, or whatever other stuff he watched late at night. Mom was probably asleep. It looked like a pretty typical night for the Borowski household.

“Thanks for the ride, Aunt Molly,” Mae said as her aunt parked in front of the house. “Have a good night.”

“You’re really not going to tell me anything, are you?” Molly asked irritably.

Mae’s hand was already on the handle for the car’s door. She stopped just short of pushing the door open when she heard her aunt’s question. Mae hesitated, unsure of if it would be better to just bolt for the house or not. Running would only wind up making Molly more PO’d, though.

“You wouldn’t believe anything I told you,” Mae replied. “You already think I’m crazy.”

Molly sighed. “I don’t think you’re crazy, Mae. I think you’re a kid. A kid who seriously needs to grow up.”

Mae opened her mouth to reply that she was twenty, and therefore not a kid, but thought better of it. Instead, she wordlessly opened up the car door and hopped out onto the street.

“Night, Aunt Molly.” Mae said, sticking her head back into the patrol car.

Molly sighed again and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she looked back at Mae from the rearview mirror.

“Good night, Mae.”

 

* * *

   
In her room, Mae stared into the harsh light of her laptop’s screen and at the brief message she’d typed into the messenger software.

HEY BEA. U UP?

Mae had typed the message out a few minutes ago, and had been staring at it ever since. She hadn’t contacted Gregg or Angus yet. For the time being, Mae wanted to make apologizing to Bea her first priority.

Mae could still remember the look on Bea’s face when Aunt Mall Cop had showed up at Casey’s home. It was once again sinking in for Mae just how closely she’d almost come to blowing everything for her friends. It sort of made her hate herself. Mae just hoped that her friends didn’t hate her too.

After another few seconds of silence, the messenger’s notification sound went off. A message popped up beside Bea’s icon in the sidebar.

I AM NOW.

Mae grimaced. She quickly went to work typing up a reply.

OH. SORRY.

Bea didn’t reply right away. Mae sighed and typed out another message.

FOR, LIKE, A LOT OF STUFF. MOSTLY ABOUT TONITE. AND ABOUT DRAGGING U ALONG ON MY DUMB TREASURE HUNT.

Mae waited for a few tense seconds to see if Bea would reply. She didn’t keep Mae waiting very long, thankfully.

THANKS. I’M MORE TIRED THAN ANGRY THO.

That took Mae by surprise.

YOUR REALLY NOT MAD?

NO. TOO TIRED. I’LL BE ANGRY AT YOU IN THE MORNING.

Mae smiled at that. After how crappy tonight had been, it was nice to have something to cheer her up. Soon, though, another message from Bea popped up.

SORRY CASEY’S THING WASN’T WHAT YOU HOPED.

Mae frowned. All at once, her disappointment about the contents of the box came back. She looked over her shoulder at the spot on the attic floor where the lockbox now sat. With a sigh, Mae went back to typing.

ITS OKAY. TO BE HONEST, I DON’T KNOW WHAT I WAS HOPING FOR. IN THE END ALL I GOT OUT OF THIS WAS I FOUND OUT CASEY WAS DEFINITELY INVOLVED IN DRUGS.

ARE U DISAPPOINTED?

Mae thought about that. The answer seemed obvious, but at the same time Mae was surprised by how she actually felt.

A LITTLE? I DON’T KNOW. I FEEL LIKE CASEY DIDN’T SO MUCH LEAVE THIS BEHIND FOR US AS HE JUST SORTA… BURIED IT AND FORGOT ABOUT IT.

WASN’T HE HIGH WHEN HE BURIED IT?

YEAH. GUESS IT WAS KINDA DUMB THINKING THAT ID GET CLOSURE FROM SOMETHING HE BURIED WHEN HE WAS STONED.

YEAH, A LITTLE.

Mae frowned thoughtfully. The more she thought about it, she’d really been expecting too much from this whole thing. And the more Mae realized how much she’d gotten her hopes up, the more Mae kind of felt like a moron.

After a few more moments of silence, another message from Bea popped up.

IVE GOTTA GO TO BED, MAE. TALK TO YOU TOMORROW?

YEAH. NITE.

Mae’s heart wasn’t exactly in it when she wished Bea goodnight, though. She was tired, and disappointed, and just a little bit frustrated. It felt like the last few months (Or weeks; Mae wasn’t 100% certain how much time had passed) had sort of been for nothing. She’d hoped that the search for Casey’s lockbox would have made things feel more… complete. She’d hoped that they’d be able to get some closure, or grant some finality to Casey’s death.

But no. Death didn’t really work like that, did it? Finding a box wouldn’t have magically given Casey’s death some sort of meaning. Nothing was going to do that. Death didn’t have a meaning.

It was just sort of a thing that happened.

“Oh, wow,” Mae muttered. “Way to be a downer, Mae.”

With an exhausted sigh, Mae stowed her laptop away and collapsed onto her bed. Then, after realizing she still had her boots on and getting up to take them off, she closed her eyes and tried to quiet her head.

In a matter of seconds, she was out like a light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, all. Apologies for the increasing space between updates for this fic. I think it'll surprise no one for me to announce that WHL is going to be going on hiatus for some time. I've run into issues with the story's ending, and it's led to some serious writer's block. While I will keep brainstorming how to wrap this story up, I'll also be taking the time to work on some other stories I've been brewing up.
> 
> Thank you all for your support and patience. I hope to come up with a satisfying ending for all of you.


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